Conference Minister's Corner 11-18-2025

When I wrote a couple weeks ago, I promised to come to an additional point of the Washington DC “Love Knows No Boarders” Conference Minister’s Advocacy Days. This is the fulfillment of that commitment.

What I wanted to speak a little more about are the impacts that are happening to refugee resettlement. Here in New Hampshire, many of our churches have participated in refugee resettlement programs. This is, of course, true across all of the United Church of Christ.

One of the main partners many of our churches have worked with is Church World Service (CWS). One of the people who did some education with us Conference Ministers was Danilo Zak, who serves as the Director of Policy for Church World Service. The missional focus of Church World Service’s refugee program is to help those who are in harm's way. That is being challenged by so many of the current policies.

In 2024, the number of refugees who were permitted to be settled in the United State was 120,000. This limit is set by the President and affirmed by congress. There are eight agencies authorized in the United State to carry out this refugee resettlement work. This is down from 10 just a couple years ago. There very well may be fewer in the years to come.

On January 20th, the Trump Administration passed an executive order to cease all refugee resettlement. There were hundreds of refugees that had gone through a thorough vetting and were approved for travel to the United States who were denied entry due to the executive order. Danilo told us the story of a family that CWS was working with. The parents in the family had already been resettled in Massachusetts. The three minor children had passed all their screenings and had plane tickets booked to Boston on January 22nd. Even though the text of the executive order signed on January 20th said it would not go into effect until January 27th, these children were denied entry to the United States. They still remain in a refugee settlement overseas.

One of the things we were waiting for while I was in Washington DC was the President to set the refugee resettlement limit for 2026. That limit was announced while I was at the airport waiting to come home. The 2026 limit is 7,500. 120,000 in 2024 and 7,500 in 2026. And most all of those refugee slots have already been committed to Afrikaners from South Africa. So already approved refugees from a place like Afghanistan and Sudan will still have to wait before they can be settled.

One, among many, of the tragic outcomes of how the current administration seems to be “gaming the system” by offering only enough refugee spots to welcome those who they have specifically invited to come to our country is refugee resettlement organizations questioning if they want to continue this work. Danilo said this was true of Church World Service, which is trying to discern if they are going to continue their work on refugee resettlement. As I said, their missional commitment is to resettle those whom they understand to be in harm’s way. If our government is no longer welcoming such folks to our country, then there may be no way for them to fulfill their mission.

While the direct advocacy work part of my week in Washington DC made a significant impact for me, so was this learning. To learn that opportunities for ministries that our churches have valued may be disappearing has left me shaken. To learn that there are those who have been approved to be resettled in the United State who are not able to come has left me heartbroken.