CLC England and Wales Gathers in Leeds
This summer, members of CLC England and Wales met at Hinsley Hall in Leeds for their National Assembly, hosted by the North West region under the guidance of Mary Sellers. The weekend took up one of the Gospel’s most searching questions, “Who IS my neighbour?”, through the CLC frontier of Globalization and Poverty, with a particular focus on migration.
A Friday evening activity invited participants to step into the shoes of someone forced to flee, leaving behind family, home and every possession. Many said it stayed with them long after. For the community’s President, it recalled the Suscipe of St Ignatius, which begins “Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty…”, a prayer of total surrender that is hard to pray. For a refugee, that surrender is not a spiritual choice but a stark reality.
Speakers, volunteers and advocates shared their experience of walking alongside refugees: helping families integrate, offering hope and supporting people through trauma that can affect generations.
The weekend challenged everyone to see refugees not as a distant problem or a political debate. Benjamin Zephaniah’s poem reminds us that we all came here from somewhere “We can all be refugees… We all came here from somewhere.”. And Hebrews 13:2 urges us: “Do not neglect hospitality, for through it some have unknowingly entertained angels.” When we welcome the stranger, we do not simply offer charity. We encounter Christ himself.
Source: Michelle Ellison, President, CLC England and Wales, 5 August 2026.
