“Project Hope for Migrants” of the Parish of Saint John the Evangelist, the Lusitanian Church in Torne, Vila Nova de Gaia, Portugal, “shows how small, consistent support – offered through real relationships – can help migrants move from crisis to stability,” said Socorro Heepe, program and administrative manager for the Convocation Refugee Grant Program (CRGP).
St. John’s began offering aid and assistance to members of their community in 2008 during the financial crisis, said Joana Pina Cabral, project administrator. They began working with banks to help participants pay their bills while also offering food support. In 2020, after meeting Giulia Bonoldi, the Convocation’s chief welcoming officer, a group of four people from the Lusitanian church went to Rome in 2023 to study the program at the Joel Nafuma Refugee Center. In August 2024, St. John’s began Project Hope with a grant from the CRGP as part of the Diaconia Secretariat of the Lusitanian Church, led by Rute Serronha.
The program now offers Portuguese language classes, legal assistance, rent support, and emergency medical funding for refugees while continuing the work with their Portuguese neighbors. “We focus on integration and legal stability,” said Pina Cabral. The help is offered on a one-to-one basis from eight volunteers who work closely with a social worker; each volunteer is assigned to a family. “This allows for a more compassionate approach.”
The Portuguese classes are primarily for Ukrainian refugees, who make up about 40 percent of the program’s participants. The classes teach practical Portuguese that enables migrants to integrate into Portuguese society and helps them to get legal jobs. “They need the language to prove they can live here, earn a living, pay their bills. This is very important work for us,” Pina Cabral explained. Many refugees consistently resisted learning Portuguese in the beginning as they expected to return to Ukraine as soon as possible. The prolonged duration of the war has forced them to redefine their lives and integrate into the labor market. These language classes have enabled them to integrate more fully into Portuguese society.
Both the community-focused and refugee-focused projects give participants vouchers for supermarkets and offer some help with rent and other bills. They provide medication and glasses, beds for families, and transportation to appointments. “We don’t give them a sack of money. We have them talk with a social worker and try to see how we can work together to meet their needs,” she added.
The Hope Project also works directly with lawyers’ offices to help migrants with the legalization process. “The system is very slow, and the law is constantly changing,” Pina Cabral noted. “It’s difficult for migrants and refugees to understand what they need.”
One of the program’s recent successes is Sushinita, who came to Portugal from Angola with her partner and a sister with Down’s Syndrome. When she became part of Project Hope, she was separated from her partner and had an infant son, in addition to her sister, and was unemployed. With the assistance of her mentors, Sushinita found a job that enables her to meet the necessary requirements for legalization for her and her sister. “The mentors of this project accompanied me during a very difficult time in my life. Through these people, I felt God’s love and presence in my life, which has given me great strength and hope,” she said.
“For me, success is helping people be independent, to be legal, to be able to afford their bills and become integrated into Portuguese society,” Pina Cabral said. “By accompanying each family closely, this project creates not just a support system, but a sense of belonging and long-term integration,” Heepe added.