Chaplains with the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team (BG-RRT) are deploying to Poland offering hope and providing comfort and compassion to families from Ukraine who have been forced to flee their homes. According to the United Nations, about 12 million people have been displaced, and Poland has taken in over three million refugees. The team of crisis-trained chaplains will work alongside Samaritan’s Purse, a Christian disaster relief organization that is working with a refugee camp just outside Warsaw, Poland.
“The refugees who are coming over to Poland are traumatized,” said international director of RRT Josh Holland. “Having been in Ukraine shortly after the start of the conflict, I don’t think I’ll ever be the same after seeing how desperate and broken people are. I came back with a passion that God could use the BG-RRT ministry to reach more refugees. We are sending chaplains to Poland to cry with them, comfort them, pray with them and let them know God loves them and has not forgotten about them.”
At the same time, chaplains continue to serve in Ukraine working alongside several Samaritan’s Purse Emergency Field Hospitals. U.S.-based chaplains have trained local Ukrainian men and women to become chaplains and now have over 100 trained in Ukraine.
For more information on the ministry, including videos, photos, news articles and an interactive map of former and current deployments, visit the BG-RRT press kit or BillyGraham.org/RRT. Updates can also be found at Facebook.com/RRTChaplains.
Media Opportunities
|
About the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team:
The Billy Graham Rapid Response Team was developed by Franklin Graham and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. It has since grown into an international network of chaplains in the U.S., U.K., Canada and Australia who are specifically trained to deal with crisis situations. They have deployed to more than 550 disaster sites across the globe, including shootings, floods, hurricanes, wildfires and tornadoes.
– 30 –
Media Contact:
Christine Batchelder
cbatchelder@bgea.org