The Beginnings of MHART

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MHART (the Medicine Hat and Area Refugee Team) began in Fall 2015, when the Canadian Government committed to resettle at least 50,000 Syrian refugees displaced by the civil war in Syria. MHART gathered volunteers from six local churches to begin fundraising to sponsor a family. Response from the churches and wider community was amazing! More than enough funding was gathered by December 2015 to apply to bring a large Syrian family to Medicine Hat in 2016.

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MHART’s First Resettlement – A Syrian Family

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MHART was matched with a Syrian family of ten in January 2016. After gathering all the household necessities to provide for this family, MHART welcomed them in June 2016. Once they were settled in a home, MHART volunteers worked alongside them to introduce them to our community, managing documentation, finding health professionals, settling the children in school, and practicing English conversation. Friendships have developed, hospitality enjoyed, and new challenges addressed, and citizenship for all ten achieved in the summer of 2022.  

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A Shift in Focus to Family Reunification

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MHART’s first resettlement experience demonstrated that this work is a growing and urgent need in Medicine Hat.  In 2019, MHART resolved to journey with those hoping to sponsor family members affected by the wide variety of challenges that turn citizens into refugees in so many parts of the world. MHART works with one family at a time, given the complexity of each situation.

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MHART’s Second Settlement – An Iranian Family

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MHART was approached by a family who fled Iran for Canada more than 10 years ago, already living in Medicine Hat. In partnership with Canadian Lutheran World Relief, MHART helped the family file the paperwork and organize an appeal to bring other members of the family to Canada from their place of refuge in Turkey. Though the global pandemic created extra challenges, volunteers were delighted to see this family reunited in November of 2020. 

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MHART’s Third Settlement – A South Sudanese Family

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MHART next met with a small family of refugees from South Sudan, who had arrived in the city from a refugee camp in Kenya. They hoped to bring six other family members from that camp (about three times the size of Medicine Hat!) to make a new life here. The fundraising goal was reached in 2022. Again, Canadian Lutheran World Relief assisted MHART with the applications which took months to work through the backlog at Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. Five family members are young adults who look forward to completing their education and finding work in our community. The sixth person sponsored is the courageous mother and grandmother who led this clan out of danger in their homeland, only to spend over twenty years in a refugee camp which has presented its own dangers. MHART longs to see this family reunited and young people who have only known deprivation begin a new future.