Help us bring an Eritrean family of four to Canada

We need your support - again!

This year, our group is sponsoring an Eritrean father who was forced to flee his country over a decade ago and has been living in limbo in a neighboring country ever since. More recently, his three teenage children fled Eritrea to avoid upcoming forced military service, which is often indefinite and is subjecting conscripts to inhuman and degrading treatment.

They are now living in precarious circumstances in Ethiopia, awaiting their travel arrangements to Canada and the opportunity to reunite with their father after 13 years. 

Eritrea is widely recognized as one of the most repressive authoritarian regimes in the world, including widespread forced labor and conscription, and staunch restrictions on freedom of expression and faith. The country is at, or near, the bottom of every socio-economic and humanitarian index.

We need $50,000 to financially support this family in their first year in Canada. 

With your help, we have an opportunity to reunite this father with his three kids and to completely change the trajectory of their lives to one of hope and opportunity.  

Tax-receipted donations can be made online via the Rosedale United Church’s donation page at Canada Helps (please click here). 

Our group has successfully sponsored and settled four families and two men, a total of 21 people, from Syria, Eritrea and Myanmar since 2015. You can read about their incredible stories, and our group's journey, by scrolling through this blog. 

Our commitment to supporting refugees is ongoing.

Thanks to you, we have brought 20 refugees to Canada

The Ripple Refugee Project is very pleased to announce the arrival of our latest privately-sponsored refugee family.

The father, Khaled, is a Syrian citizen who fled the civil war in 2012 and has been residing in precarious circumstances in Ethiopia since then. Our application to sponsor him, his wife Abeba, and their daughter was submitted on March 31, 2016 and we are thrilled that they finally arrived in mid-October and are quickly and easily settling into their new home.

We also wanted to let you know that after 12 months, our financial support for the Eritrean mother and her 5 children has now formally ended. However, a number of our volunteers have become close friends with the mother and quite attached to the kids so will continue to remain engaged with the family and helping out where we can.

Because of your generous support, in some cases going all the way back to 2015, and our careful stewardship of your donations, our group has been able to sponsor, help settle and integrate 4 families and a single young man for a total of 20 people altogether! We are also happy to announce that several of these families had babies this year - a testament to their feeling safe and hopeful in their new environment.

At our recent Ripple member meeting we started discussing new sponsorship opportunities and will be in touch in the coming year about our plans. In the meantime, we would welcome any further donations you may wish to provide.

Tax-receipted donations can be made online via our Sponsorship Agreement Holder (SAH) with the Canadian Government - which is the Rosedale United Church (please note that Ripple is a secular group). Please select "Ripple Project Fund" from the drop-down box titled Apply your donation to a specific fund or indicate in the message box that the donation is for: "the Ripple Refugee Project".

Refugees in need of sponsors

Two of the three families we helped settle in Canada, including the Eritrean family of five who arrived in November 2018, have come here through the BVOR program.

The program is designed to resettle refugees identified by the UNHCR that have been referred to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC).The BVOR program is a “blended” program because it is a cost-sharing arrangement whereby the Canadian government and private sponsors contribute financially to support the refugees. Private sponsors are also responsible for providing settlement support to the refugees for 12 months.

Our group decided for a number of reasons to focus on BVOR-refugees rather than on named-case sponsorships. Although bringing in refugees through this program is fast, and doesn't require to raise a lot of money, there appears to be a shortage of community sponsorship groups who are putting up their hands for BVOR refugees.

The Canada office of the UNHCR produced a video, featuring the Ripple Refugee group, to encourage other Canadians to welcome refugees through this unique program. If we can do it, so can you!