MIAMI — When Refugee Sunday was first established in the Florida Conference in the 1960s, ministry to refugees was "romantic," according to the Rev. Brice Harris, pastor of First United Methodist Church, Pompano Beach, and chairman of the conference’s Refugee Ministry Task Force. "We were helping Cubans and fighting communism. It was all very romantic."

Today, he says, the romance has worn off as the number of refugees has grown. The Florida Conference annually touches the lives of approximately 4,100 refugees who have fled from Cuba, Haiti, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and Indonesia.

"We’re the first line of defense," Harris said. "We meet the needs of people who come here with nothing on their backs. For more than two decades, we’ve helped thousands to become settled in the United States at a time when no other resources were available to them."

The needs include necessities like health and school kits, food, and furniture, according to Judith Pierre Okerson, a member of Grace Haitian United Methodist Church in Miami and a supervisor with Church World Services. Refugees also need help find housing and employment.

Many refugees need to be oriented to their new life in a new country, according to Harris. "We try to acclimate parents into American culture," he says. "What is considered child abuse here is just discipline in another culture."

Funding for the refugee ministry comes from the annual Refugee Sunday offering Feb. 20 and the United Methodist Committee on Relief’s (UMCOR) Global Refugee Response Advance #982540-1. Florida Conference churches gave $1,500 last year, while UMCOR put $35,000 toward the ministry, Harris said.