Cardinal Thomas Collins launches $3M refugee resettlement campaign

WATCH: Toronto Catholics launch ‘Project Hope’ to raise funds to help save Syrian refugees

TORONTO – The Archbishop of Toronto, Cardinal Thomas Collins, has announced the launch of a refugee resettlement campaign to help bring families of war, violence and persecution to Canada.

The campaign named Project Hope is in addition to the Archdiocese of Toronto’s private sponsorship initiative that has already resettled 2,519 refugees since 2009.

“Sadly this isn’t a recent epidemic. It’s a story that has been unfolding for years,” said Cardinal Collins during a press conference in Toronto on Tuesday. “While we watch from a far, families are torn apart forever.”

READ MORE: Napalm survivor Kim Phuc says Syrian boy photo ‘can make a difference’

The appeal for help includes a fundraising goal of $3-million in the next 100 days to bring 100 families to Canada and settle in the Greater Toronto Area.

“I’m inviting the Catholic community of the Archdiocese of Toronto and all people of good will to financially support those who are fleeing war, violence and persecution,” Cardinal Collins said.

Collins is also calling on those who are unable to provide financial support to offer their time to volunteer instead.

“We will prioritize families coming from war-torn countries. These include Syria and Iraq where we have set up hundreds of families to date,” said Dr. Martin Mark, Director of the Office for Refugees.

Mark said it typically costs about $30,000 to sponsor a family of four to come to Canada and have them settle here in their first year.

The plea for financial assistance comes two days after Pope Francis called on Catholic parishes, convents and monasteries to help shelter refugees.

“Faced with the tragedy of tens of thousands of refugees who are fleeing death by war and by hunger, and who are on a path toward a hope for life, the Gospel calls us to be neighbours to the smallest and most abandoned, to give them concrete hope,” Francis said.

The urgent call for assistance comes after the photograph of a drowned Syrian boy washed ashore in Turkey horrified the world.

Since then, a number of municipal and provincial leaders have lent their support to accommodate Syrian refugees to Canada.

READ MORE: Canadian mayors, provinces asking to partner with feds to help Syrian refugees

Ontario recently pledged $300,000 for Lifeline Syria – an organization that is trying to bring 1,000 Syrian refugees to Toronto.

Manitoba has offered $40,000 to help settlement service providers and Quebec expects to bring in 1,900 Syrians by the end of 2015.

A new poll released Tuesday by Mainstreet Technologies finds 48 per cent of respondents, who are closely watching the unfolding of the Syrian refugee crisis, would support a dramatic increase in refugee resettlement in Canada.

Meanwhile, close to half (48 per cent) of those surveyed disapprove of the government’s response to the crisis.

According to the Archdiocese of Toronto, the diocese is Canada’s largest stretching from Toronto north to Georgian Bay and from Oshawa to Mississauga.