The Young Caritas Europa Forum took place from Thursday 29 August to Sunday 01 September 2024 in Athens, Greece
The Young Volunteers Task Force organised the Forum with the theme, “Bridging hearts, building hope” in order to encourage young volunteers continuing to enact Caritas values. ‘The aim of the Forum [was] to allow its participants to grow as volunteers – to improve volunteering skills, create an international network of young Caritas volunteers, exchange good practices and ideas, and strengthen the motivation for long-term volunteering.’ (1)
After landing in Athens airport in the mid-afternoon, we travelled to a Caritas Hellas Social Centre (a Caritas Hellas project) and informally met with other delegates who had also convened at this spot whilst we all waited for the coach to take us up to our base for the next few days, Manresa Hellas, a Jesuit Retreat Centre. The Young Caritas Europa Forum was open to volunteers and young professionals from across the European region. The CSAN team were joined by CSAN member, Million Minutes and together we represented the youth of England and Wales.
On Friday morning we visited two migration projects. At the first one, we learned about the broad mission of Caritas Hellas. It has existed in its current form since 1994. The the Adama Center [sic] was the second project we visited. They explained their work in helping those integrate into Greek society, primarily through providing advice and information to those seeking asylum. Asylum claim application lengths usually depended on the claimant’s country of origin (shorter times for those from Palestine, longer for those from Democratic Republic of Congo, for example). One way that integration has been most successful is through accessing securing employment. They noted that working migrants are largely accepted in Greece, particularly in the hospitality industry. Current estimates suggest that there are between 40,000-60,000 open job positions. This project was supported by UNCHR and Catholic Relief Services (one part of Caritas USA).
We also took part in the ‘Integral Ecology’ scavenger hunt devised by Young Caritas Europa, on the grounds of our retreat centre. This was first launched at World Youth Day 2023 in Lisbon, aimed at introducing some of the work of Caritas to the 1.5 million young people that attended the event. It encouraged us to reflected on the role of human agency in the wider environmental context.
Presentations across the weekend were from Caritas Czech Republic, Caritas Slovenia, Caritas Diocese of Brescia (Italy), and Cordaid (Caritas Netherlands) on their local refugee integration projects. We also heard from the central office of Caritas Europa as they explained their advocacy work in relation to asylum and migration. They informed us that as many as 117.3 million people were forcibly displaced at the end of 2023. This equated to more than 1 in 69 people on Earth. According to Caritas Europa, the largest proportion of refugees globally were from Afghanistan and Syria, both with 6.4 million people each. These numbers were followed by Venezuela (6.1 million) and Ukraine (6.0 million).
On Saturday evening, we relaxed in the courtyard, joined in with the disco, and were able to participate in national dances (of which the Ukrainian and Lithuanian ones were particularly fun).
Gathering with our Caritas colleagues in Athens was a very valuable experience. It was useful to about the variety of Caritas structures across the region are, and of course, it was wonderful to connect with colleagues from all over Europe.
Bernadette Durcan
Research and Programmes Officer
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