Tag: london-catholic-worker

Barbara Kentish speaks at the Home Office Vigil for Migrants and Asylum Seekers 17 March 2025

London Catholic Worker members at the 17 March 2025 Home Office Vigil. Photo: LCW

The regular monthly Home Office Vigil was held on 17 March 2025, to commemorate the thousands of refugees who have died, trying to reach a place of safety in Europe.

Barbara Kentish writes:

We heard today from a brother who simply asks the international community for a humanitarian system, a recognition that ordinary people are destroyed in the current world order. And we heard from the gospel reading Jesus’s simple message – Be compassionate, as your heavenly Father is compassionate. Give and it will be given back to you.

How do we keep on being compassionate, calling for compassion, giving compassion in this broken world? I want to share an experience I had recently which struck a chord, and showed me one or two ways we manage to keep on feeling and showing this compassion.

A week ago we celebrated International Women’s Day, and I was asked to talk about our Home Office Vigil from a women’s perspective, which I found difficult, as the people we commemorate are women and men, probably more of the latter. And the people who come to pray are women and men. Reading through the months of stories for inspiration, however, I did come across stories such as this one that we read a few months ago, which seems very immediate, because it is one woman, and she is named, as is her child:

A mother and baby from Senegal, both called Touré, died on a boat adrift for over a week in the Mediterranean. A bag containing the baby’s food fell into the sea, and he starved to death. His mother died from exhaustion and grief. Their bodies were thrown into the sea. What an agony for that mother.

There seem to be more women recorded amongst the deaths of those travelling from Senegal via the Canary islands. Maybe this is a recent trend. Women travelling are nearly always more vulnerable than the men. Such desperation, to make them take to the boats. But to think of one example, one woman, one baby, brings home an immediacy that numbers can blunt. A name, a person.

In my Women’s day celebrations I met women involved in craft work, whether art, knitting or weaving. This resonated with me, as I love making things: I do lots of crochet work, making jumpers or cardigans. Creative work really restores the soul in some way, even though most of the finished products will never be seen in any art galleries. It’s our need to contribute something to the world, to celebrate the beauty around us. How do we create beauty in this broken asylum system, where so many lives are ground down or simply damaged? We create together, we cook together, we sing together. We make beauty. And that is where God gives back, a hundredfold, pressed down and running over.

I am going to read a poem by a Lutheran minister that was read at my gathering on International Women’s Day. It’s called ……

To Weavers Everywhere

God sits weeping
The beautiful creation tapestry
She wove with such joy
Is mutilated, torn into shreds,
Reduced to rags,
Its beauty fragmented by force.

God sits weeping.
But look!
She is gathering up the shreds
To weave something new.

She gathers
The rags of hard work
Attempts at advocacy,
Initiatives for peace,
Protests against injustice,
All the seemingly little and weak
Words and deeds offered
Sacrificially
In hope, in faith, in love.

And look!
She is weaving them all
With golden threads of Jubilation
Into a new tapestry,
A creation richer, more beautiful
Than the old one was!

God sits weaving
Patiently, persistently,
With a smile that
Radiates like a rainbow
On her tear-streaked face.

And She invites us
Not on1y to keep offering her the
Shreds and rags of our suffering
And our work,

But even more –
To take our place beside Her
At the Jubilee Loom,
And weave with her
The tapestry of the New Creation.

Marchiena Rienstra (Presbyterian minister and poet)

More Information

Monthly Memorial Prayer Vigil for Refugees and Asylum-Seekers
On the 3rd Monday of every month outside the Home Office, SW1P 4DF, 12:30pm to 1:30pm

Download the Prayer Sheet for the November Vigil 2024

Praying for

  • Those who died trying to reach the UK
  • Victims of current wars
  • Those in detention and who are homeless
  • The UK to be a more welcoming nation

Sign up to receive email news & alerts of changes or cancellation at: homeofficevigil@gmail.com

Co-sponsored by:
Westminster Justice and Peace Commission
London Catholic Worker
London Churches Refugee Fund


Three Years of Home Office Vigils for Migrants

October 2024 Vigil outside the Home Office. Photo: Pat Gaffney

By Abi Yendole

This month’s Migrants Vigil at the government’s Home Office in London marked three years of monthly prayers there for people who have died trying to reach the UK and for the UK to be a more welcoming nation. An organiser, Barbara Kentish, said. “If only we could say things were better, but alas, we need to pray harder than ever.” The one-hour vigils are co-sponsored by Westminster Justice and Peace Commission, London Catholic Worker and London Churches Refugee Fund.

Brother Johannes Maertens of the London Catholic Worker gave a reflection on his visits to Calais and the work of an arts refugee project that uses maps and art to encourage refugees to tell their stories. He commented that some of the young men he met had been on the road for six years.

The names of people who died a year ago – in October 2023 – trying to enter Europe or the UK were read out and a prayer of repentance said afterwards: “You told us to welcome strangers in our land, but we have hated, humiliated, imprisoned, and killed those who have asked for our hospitality. Forgive us and help us to change.”

Around 30 people attended the latest vigil on Monday 21 October. James Trewby (Columban Justice, Justice, Peace and Ecology coordinator) and Abi Yendole (Columban Faith in Action Volunteer) accompanied the Justice and Peace Committee of 16 Year 10 students and one teacher from St George’s School in Maida Vale to the vigil.

One student said afterwards: “Hearing all the names and stories of those who have died meant I was able to personify every victim; give every victim a face; it was powerful.” Pope Francis has said something similar, captured on the refugee memorial in Dover, that, “every migrant has a name, a face and a story.” Another student said: “As a member of the justice and peace group, going to the Home office to pray for refugees has been a profound and humbling experience. Standing in solidarity praying for those seeking safety and refuge, I felt the weight of their struggles and the urgency of advocating for justice. In the quiet moment of prayer, we offered up hope for a system that could see beyond the borders to the humanity of those in need. It was both a spiritual act of compassion and a call for action, reminding me of the power of community and faith in pursuing change.”

Also present on Monday were representatives from churches around London, Jesuit Refugee Service, London Catholic Worker, Pax Christi England and Wales and Seeking Sanctuary.

Intercessions included the prayer: “We pray for the end of the hostile environment, and the creation of safe, legal routes to claim asylum in this country.”

Watch: Refugee Action Video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcaM89VzkEY