Moving From Stranger to Neighbor: Using Parish Volunteers for Newcomer Integration

Video file

About This Recording

In part two of our series on incorporating parish volunteers into immigration-related services, we move our focus to immigrant integration. Immigrant integration occurs most successfully at the local level, particularly because a community designs its response around the local and immediate needs of its community members.

Thus, the impact that a local faith community can have on the larger community's welcome to newcomers cannot be overstated. Welcoming the stranger is a basic tenet of many faith communities, including Catholic, but how do you do it? Staff from Catholic Charities USA, the Catholic Legal Immigration Network, and USCCB's Department of Migration and Refugee Services will share best practices in motivating, coordinating, and sustaining parish volunteers committed to integrating refugees and other immigrants into our common home.

Date Recorded