Anchorage, Alaska, Jul 18, 2009 / 12:21 pm
In Anchorage, Catholic Social Services is committed to living out the Gospel mandate, in which Jesus called his followers to welcome the stranger. This is a blessing for people like the Kafley family, who fled the terrors of ethnic cleansing in their homeland of Bhutan in the Eastern Himalayas.
"The government of Bhutan was trying to rid Bhutan of people of Nepalese origin," explained Patrick Pillai, who mentors the Kafleys through a CSS program. "People were fleeing the country, but Nepal did not want to accept them all because it would sanction the persecution."
As the official refugee resettlement agency for Alaska, CSS is commissioned to receive people who can no longer live in their own country due to political or religious persecution, war, famine, ethnic cleansing and a host of other woes. If Alaska has been chosen as their destination from among those sent by the United Nations to the U.S., CSS does the work of acclimating them to their new homeland. Fortunately there are many volunteers, including Patrick and Vani Pillai, the Kafleys’ mentors.
The Kafley family, and thousands of others, were put in United Nations-sponsored refugee camps in Nepal. Of their four children, all but the oldest son were born in the camp, where they awaited their fate.