Last December, HIAS Chicago, working with Mishkan Chicago, welcomed its first refugee family of four through the agency’s Congregational Co-Sponsorship Program. HIAS Chicago is a program of Jewish Child & Family Services and a partner with the Jewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago in serving our community.

In 2012, Jaafar and Fatema, along with their two young sons, fled war-torn Aleppo and lived as refugees in Jordan. The family’s arrival marks the first time HIAS Chicago has resettled refugees from one of three countries currently with the highest number of refugees (Syria, Iraq, and Congo), according to Jessica Schaffer, director of HIAS Chicago. Admission to the United States as a refugee is determined by the federal government through the State Department and is based on an individual being unable to return to their country of origin because of a well-founded fear of persecution.

From the 1970s through the 1990s, HIAS Chicago focused primarily on resettling some 30,000 Jews and others from the former Soviet Union. Now, HIAS Chicago has been contracted by the federal government to resettle 60 individuals during this fiscal year and hopes to find four or five more congregations to sponsor them.

Under the new Congregation Co-Sponsorship Program, synagogues and spiritual communities find volunteers for welcome and mentor teams, complete a three-hour training session on refugee resettlement, and commit to raising $5,000-the minimum required to resettle one family.

“Our work with HIAS has been an incredible way to translate the inspiration people feel through the learning and services, into action,” said Rabbi Lizzi Heydemann, of Mishkan Chicago.

After quickly exceeding the $5,000 minimum, Mishkan helped resettle a second family from Iraq last month.

Also last December, Temple Sholom of Chicago’s board decided to participate in the program and raised nearly half of its $5,000 goal. Members of the congregation gathered at Target in Uptown for an education program about refugees, and purchased items for the family’s anticipated arrival this spring.

“There’s a lot of buzz building around the project. Here we are helping this one family, and that feels really good,” said Rabbi Shoshana Conover, of Temple Sholom.

Members of Highland Park’s Lakeside Congregation have been motivated by Jews’ collective history of persecution, according to HIAS volunteer and congregant Jackie Cohen, who is co-leading the project with Susan Gottlieb.

“So many of our grandparents left their home countries because of persecution. That’s a terrible way to live. Anything we can do in small measure to help-I feel that’s the right thing to do,” said Cohen.

Lakeside Congregation also plans for a refugee family’s arrival this spring. Other congregations in the planning stages include Anshe Emet Synagogue in Chicago, KAM Isaiah Israel in Hyde Park, Kol Sasson Congregation in Skokie, and Temple Jeremiah in Northfield.

HIAS Chicago is a program of Jewish Child and Family Services, a partner with the Jewish United Fund in serving our community. For more information contact Director of HIAS Chicago, Jessica Schaffer, at [email protected] .

Jennifer Brody is a former associate editor at JUF News and is a freelance writer living in Chicago.