Shoe Sparkle in Lancashire
“Imagine walking home in bare feet, for hours in the cold, knowing that when you finally make it, there are no other shoes waiting for you.”
In Syria today nearly thirteen and a half million people are in need of humanitarian assistance. Just over six and a half million people have been displaced and the journey of these vulnerable people have to make to find safety and security is not unlike the journey that many of the people we serve have to take each and every day.
They often find it difficult to feel accepted in the community they live in. Some of the people we serve have felt undervalued and discriminated against too. What they want and what they have a right to, is the opportunity, like everyone else, to become a valued member of society.
Britain has agreed to welcome 20,000 vulnerable refuges desperate to find a place of safety after leaving their homeland and the daily destruction that happens there every day. We have seen images of refugee children having their shoes taken away from them before they are able to continue their journey to safety. It is an act that not only removes their shoes but also their dignity.
At a time when respect and compassion seem to be rare occurrences, people served by ubu and their enabling staff teams in Lancashire decided that they wanted to do something that could make a small difference to some of the children and their families who are being resettled in our region.
We have been sorting through our own clothes and shoes and have found that we have enough to donate some of them to a local group for those people who are being resettled into Lancashire. We want to help to make sure that no child has to go without shoes this Christmas.
We believe that by showing compassion and welcome to everyone we help to make sure that every human being is given the dignity and respect that have a right to. Sometimes the smallest things are the most important things.
