Running to stand still: a Saturday morning sanctuary from living in fear

Before starting the 5km run which is their sanctuary for one day Graham Clifford circles the group together and gets each man, woman and child to call out their name.

Hicham. Gavin. Adebayo. Amara. Laurent. Tom. Tapiwa. Georgiy. Jane. Meseret. Another Mary too.

Names, not numbers. Now more than ever.

Clifford then points towards the car park and tells them all to leave their troubles and fears over there. They can wait at least until the way back out. This is about the here and now, not the there and then, and so they set off and run, because that is what they do.

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Only this is no race, or anything about a race for that matter. It’s about asylum seekers and refugees and Irish citizens coming together as one without fear and being visible about that too.

It’s also the first and ever-increasing purpose and need of the Sanctuary Runners, the small voluntary group with big ideas that is fast moving forward and never looks back. It’s a 9.30am start and it’s their time and space when everyone gets to run at their own pace.

This gathering, last Saturday morning at the 5km parkrun in Ballincollig in Cork, doubles as a little celebration of their fifth birthday, the Sanctuary Runners first born in 2018 out of a vision and necessity to help integrate into the local community those living in direction provision in this country. My, how it’s grown.

Turn on the news or read about the numbers. More than 4,500 refugees and asylum seekers arrive in Ireland since start of the year; Government is scrambling to find more places to house new arrivals; Anti-immigrant protesters block several Dublin streets.

Clifford is the Sanctuary Runners founder, living in Fermoy, and as a former journalist in no way naive or innocent to the realities of the situation gone bad. The fear or the hatred. He’s just not here to talk about that: he’s here to talk about the good in people because he sees it every time the Sanctuary Runners get together and recognise not the differences but the things they have in common, all served not out of any charity but simple solidarity.

Their first group outing was the Cork City Marathon in 2018, where 51 asylum seekers from the then five direct provision centres in Cork, spanning 40 nationalities, were part of 200 runners that ran, or for some parts walked, the 26.2 miles. Such was the response and goodwill Clifford felt obliged to grow it from there.

Last May, back at the Cork City Marathon, the Sanctuary Runners numbered 450, including 90 men and women from Ukraine, others more local, all running the classic distance together or as part of the team relay. They’ll be back in Cork this May in bigger numbers again, with ever more of those people living in fear, for safe accommodation or any sort of livelihood in this country or for the family and loved ones in the country they left behind.

Within its first year the Sanctuary Runners spread to around a dozen locations throughout the country, most tied in with the Saturday morning parkrun events. Now they’re up around 30 locations, with plans to make it 50 by the end of this year, new groups setting up every week, from Ballaghaderreen last Saturday, to Borrisokane this Saturday, plus Youghal and Celbridge and Kinsale in the last month.

Part of that growth has come from setting up in locations where Ukrainian people have moved since the war, when before the Sanctuary Runners set up locations more around the direct provision centres. One year on since Russia’s illegal invasion, around 70,000 Ukrainians arrived in Ireland in 2022 and it’s at least easier to see the need to make that presence felt.

One measure of all this is the 10,000 or so Sanctuary Runners T-shirts, in fetching sky blue and yellow logo, that have been handed out for free at running events over the last five years. The problem is those seeking or in need of some integration are increasingly spread out, not just in the direct provision centre, or before that the Balseskin reception centre, but now in part due to the invasion of Ukraine there’s also emergency accommodation, hotels, the bed and breakfast, the hostel, pre-reception centres, all in the queue to get into a queue.

“Now more than ever is that phrase which keeps cropping up in the work we do,” Clifford tells me. “I think a lot of people are afraid, which is awful situation to have got ourselves in.

“But we don’t focus on any negativity, the chaos, the fear, our only focus is on positivity, bringing people together, away from the disconnect of direct provision or emergency accommodation, not setting them apart. Fear is a negative emotion, it serves no good.

“It’s about doing something with refugees and asylum seekers, rather than for. And part of that natural evolution is to give some sanctuary to people who moved to Ireland for reasons beyond seeking asylum, or as refugees, but came here to find work, to find love. It’s key that we are every bit as welcoming to them, showing that respect, regardless of nationality or skin colour or legal status or creed.”

Running is proving the perfect platform for all that and not just for obvious reasons: that Saturday morning rush of endorphins may only be temporary, but the friendships made along the way can last a lifetime.

“We could have people who have never left Cork, and people who have come from very far away, sharing in the moment of positivity, and the hope that nothing can’t be overcome. Say a farmer from Youghal running alongside someone who has come from Syria, and that’s no big deal, just looking at that same finish line.”

They don’t fund raise and don’t seek donations, and other plans have been hatched, including the Sanctuary Swimmers, a joint venture between Swim Ireland and the Sanctuary Runners, piloted in Cork last year, and coming to six locations in the country this summer. Clifford also has plans to get one million people running in solidarity with migrants all across the world next summer, ahead of the Paris Olympics perhaps.

“And I think we need so many more initiatives like this,” Clifford says, “driving for community integration, not against it.”

For more see www.sanctuaryrunners.ie