Did you know that the We Welcome community began with a blog post? In 2015, author Ann Voskamp wrote about the Syrian refugee crisis and lit a fire among Christian women. Lamenting the death of 3-year old Alan Kurdi, Voskamp called followers of Jesus to not look away from this tragedy. Soon after publishing the post, Voskamp concluded from the overwhelming response that there was an urgent need for the church to be more informed about the biblical call to welcome. 

We Welcome Refugees was originally created as a website for people to learn more about refugees and how they could help. As the community continued to grow and expand to social media, Tess Clarke stepped in as Director, bringing insight from her years of experience in serving among the refugee community in Dallas, Texas. As the political environment began to heat up around not just refugees, but also asylum seekers, Dreamers, and other immigrants, Tess saw the need to expand both the vision and the team. She saw the need for empowering the welcome of those who don’t meet the legal definition of refugees, but still face injustice and a need for security. So in 2021, We Welcome Refugees officially became We Welcome to reflect a more expansive vision of welcoming the stranger. That year Tess also expanded the team to engage across the country and grow the welcome movement.

We Welcome has partnered with other organizations over the years to spread the message of welcome: originally with World Relief and The Justice Conference, and now with the National Immigration Forum. We are passionate about welcome, and we invite you to join us in this movement.Don’t worry about sounding professional. Sound like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest. If you read the words back and don’t hear your own voice in your head, that’s a good sign you still have more work to do.