Bring Angelo's Family To America

Angelo and his family are displaced refugees living in Cairo, Egypt. Their living conditions are very difficult. His family is not safe in Egypt, among rising racial tensions in the country. His family faces daily harassment and discrimination based on the color of their skin. As refugees, they are not offered the same rights and protections as citizens of Egypt. Work is difficult to find for Angelo and his wife Winne. Money is incredibly hard to come by. The future of his children is unknown, due to a lacking education system and the unequal rights of refugees. His family is not able to obtain necessary medical care. Due to the instability in South Sudan, Angelo and his family cannot return to their home country for fear of life imprisonment or death. Angelo recently shared with me that he incredibly distraught, and stays up at night crying because of the unknown future of his family. He is desperate for opportunity, and as a community we have the ability to come together and provide this opportunity for this wonderful family.

A new immigration program launched in January of 2023. WelcomeCorps is a community led sponsorship program. It allows five to ten people to form a group to help transition refugee families into our community. This group of people agrees to take responsibility for guiding refugee families into life in America for their first 90 days. These sponsors will facilitate fundraising help, secure housing and furnishings, arrange for utilities to be turned on, provide clothing, provide transportation to and from necessary appointments, connect the family to local resources and government (and community) aid agencies, connect the family to healthcare and mental healthcare services, collaborate with refugee newcomers to create a household budget, locate local workforce services, enroll the children into school, connect to translation services, and connect to affordable language classes. We will orient refugees to our community, to public transit systems, to the laws and rules, and facilitate connections to local ethnic and religious communities.

Here are our first two steps:

We need to find at least three more people to sponsor this family.

We need to raise a MINIMUM of $12,125 to support the start of this family's journey.

I know that these tasks seem overwhelming. Welcomcorps has written wonderful, easy to use guidelines that break each task down into baby steps. It’s a lot, and I don't deny that. However, I am so confident that if we lay this project in the hands of our community, that our community will respond to it and provide everything that we need to get this done.

We start our fundraising journey here. I urge you to share this with your own personal community. I urge you to send any resources that you have knowledge of. I urge you to discuss this with the churches, organizations, and community leaders that you know.

Angelo is a hard working man, and only wishes to secure safety and opportunity for his wife and three children. He is seeking a legal pathway into our country. He is desperate. He is a strong and proud man of a strong and proud family, who is begging for our help.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this. I hope you will share it.