Search for Common Ground

The World Cup asks us to celebrate a world connected by people, cultures, languages, and stories.

World Refugee Day asks a harder question:

Why do we celebrate people crossing borders when they’re wearing a jersey, but question them when they’re seeking safety?

The same diversity we cheer on the soccer field is often feared everywhere else.

Yet every day, refugees are building businesses, strengthening communities, raising families, and creating opportunities where others see only crises.

Refugees aren’t the story of what was lost.
They’re the story of what survives. And what gets built next.

Peace isn’t the absence of conflict. It’s the presence of connection.

In our new Voices of Peace series, we’re spotlighting people whose experiences have reshaped how they understand peace.

This month, world-renowned opera singer Ryan McKinny shares how parenthood, art, and deep listening taught him that lasting peace begins when we choose to see one another as fully human.

Before they were World Cup players, they were children with dreams.

Children who deserved safety.
Children who deserved opportunity.
Children who deserved a future.

This World Refugee Month, we celebrate four athletes whose journeys remind us of a simple truth: when people are given the chance to rebuild, they don’t just survive—they help shape our world for the better.

The women once told to stay quiet are now leading peace in the places conflict hits hardest. Across coastal Kenya, women are stepping into prisons, security spaces, and community forums as mediators, mentors, and peacebuilders.

What’s changing isn’t just who has a seat at the table, but who is redesigning the table itself. And that shift is transforming entire communities.

Peace doesn’t always look the way we expect. Sometimes it looks like women learning a new skill, starting a business, and building trust across community lines.

In Hagadera, what began as tie-and-dye training grew into livelihoods, friendships, and a future shaped together. Because when people have the opportunity to thrive, peace has room to grow.

For one month, billions of people from different countries, beliefs, and backgrounds gather around the same game. That’s the quiet power of football: it creates spaces where connection becomes bigger than division. 

Across communities impacted by conflict, sport has helped rebuild trust, create belonging, and bring people back together again. The World Cup isn’t just a tournament. It’s a reminder of what’s still possible when people choose community over conflict.

This World Refugee Month, we’re celebrating the women in Burundi weaving more than baskets. They’re weaving income, confidence, and new futures for their families and communities. 

What started as listening sessions around a radio became small businesses, shared knowledge, and renewed hope. Peacebuilding sometimes looks less like a conference room and more like women sitting side by side, creating something together.