St Nicholas of Tolentino has become Bristol’s first church to be awarded Church of sanctuary by City of Sanctuary under its Faith stream category. The award is a recognition of the church’s work supporting asylum seekers, refugees and vulnerable people including homeless people in the city.
“Faith communities are natural places of welcome and can play an important role in the lives of people seeking sanctuary and in the education of the public in general and we hope to extend this work across the city as more faith places are showing an interest,” said Forward Maisokwadzo, Media & Communications Officer, City of Sanctuary.
He said we use Sanctuary Awards to recognise any organisation’s commitment to welcoming people seeking sanctuary and celebrating their contributions. The more mainstream organisations, groups/institutions who commit to our shared vision for every place to be one of welcome and safety for all, the more we are contributing to making Bristol as a real city of sanctuary. Any organisation can be recognised for its commitment to learning about what it means to be a sanctuary seeker, embedding welcome into their context as appropriate and sharing their achievements with others to continue the momentum of movement building across the city of Bristol.
The Church will be celebrating their recognition with a special event in the near future.
