LWF leaders visit Caritas headquarters and discuss strengthening partnerships on refugee response
(LWI) - On the eve of World Refugee Day, leaders of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) and Caritas Internationalis, the Catholic Church’s confederation of aid and development agencies, met together in Rome and discussed closer cooperation in responding to the urgent needs of people on the move in many parts of the globe.
A delegation of LWF leaders, headed by President Bishop Henrik Stubkjær, is currently in Rome for a two-day visit which will include an audience with Pope Francis on Thursday morning. The group also held talks with Cardinal Kurt Koch and officials of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, ahead of the launch of a new phase of dialogue between the LWF and the Roman Catholic Church.
Noting that the United Nations recently announced record numbers of people displaced worldwide, LWF’s Director of World Service, Maria Immonen said closer partnerships with Caritas was vital to support the most vulnerable people fleeing from violence, conflict and extreme weather-related emergencies.
Longstanding humanitarian collaboration
“Recent years have seen a rapid rise in man-made disasters, conflict and war, often lasting for decades without peace agreements or political solutions,” Immonen said. “The latest UNHCR figures show that forced displacement has risen to include 120 million people, the highest number in history and many of them are surviving in dire circumstances in remote and hard to reach places,” she continued.
She noted that humanitarian collaboration between Lutherans and Catholics goes back to the founding of the LWF in the aftermath of the Second World War. She recalled the signing, in 2016 during the joint commemoration of the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, of a formal partnership agreement between Caritas and the LWF.
Our faith calls us to stand together for the sake of our neighbors in need
Maria Immonen, LWF Director of World Service
“We have served together in the past to support vulnerable communities in different parts of the world, including Ethiopia, South Sudan, Colombia, Syria, Nepal and the Central African Republic,” Immonen noted. “Our commitment was further strengthened by a ‘Common Vision’ statement that we drew up in 2021 and will receive new impetus from our meeting today.”
Welcoming the delegation to the Caritas headquarters in Rome, Secretary General Alistair Dutton said he was looking forward to “strengthening collaboration in places where we are already working together and [to] see how we can apply this in other countries too.” He identified advocacy as “a real opportunity for us to work together, particularly on migration and climate justice,” noting that “the number of those displaced by climate “is going to increase by much greater numbers that what we see as a result of conflict.”
“As the humanitarian environment becomes increasingly challenging and mass displacement continues to grow, our faith calls us to stand together for the sake of our neighbors in need,” Maria Immonen concluded.
