Nargis Mohammadi, originally from Afghanistan, shared this reflection on her experiences participating in our Cathedral of Sanctuary activities. Nargis wrote a poem for our Refugee Week ‘Journeys of Healing’ project in June, and then in July volunteered for one week as part of our ‘Birds with Wishes’ creativity camp, organised in collaboration with Places of ARcture.

While I was back in my home Afghanistan, I had never been to any other religion’s holy place because there weren’t any, as Afghanistan is an Islamic country.

Sometimes I was afraid that people from different religion might be discriminate against us for being Muslim. When I got evacuated to Ireland and met different people, I realized that humanity is above any religion. I started doing some volunteer work with Abigail in Christ Church Cathedral where we were working with refugee children from different countries, religions and ethnicities. For one week we were meeting each other every day and working together to have a good outcome at the end of our mini summer camp project. Everyone in the church was welcoming us everyday and I haven’t seen anyone being rude to us because we were not Christian.

A one-week volunteering experience in the church has taught me that people can live and work together. While we can’t pray together, what matters is humanity and being nice to each other.