Thursday, February 28, 2008

Karen Refugees of Phoenix

I received this email from my buddy Jeff the other day:
After I saw the new Rambo movie, I was compelled to call the Arizona Republic and tell them that a large group of the people that were being exterminated in the Rambo movie are living here in Phoenix. They sent out a reporter and a photographer last weekend, and the story ran today, ALL over Phoenix....and my phone is ringing off the hook!

The article isn't completely accurate and he attributes some things to me that I didn't say, but overall, it gets the point across.

Thought you'd enjoy seeing it.

It's an interesting article. Here's an excerpt:
The Rev. Jeff Jackson came to West Dunlap in December in large part because of his decade-long background of working with Karen refugees in Thailand.

He and Glenn Ramey, who has served as the church's pastor for the past 41 years, estimate that 250 Karen now attend their church. It is a remarkable story of regeneration for a once demographically obsolete church that was dying just three years ago.

The base of the church's congregation, Caucasian city-dwellers, had left for the Valley's expanding suburbs. Ramey struggled with the church's decline and gave serious consideration to closing it down and putting the land up for sale. But at the depth of the demographic crisis, recently arrived Karen refugees, many unable to speak English, began showing up at its doors.

"The infusion of the Karen was a great blessing to us," Ramey said.

Read the rest of the article here: link

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

What a mighty hand God has