About NSMA

The New Sanctuary Movement of Atlanta (NSMA) is an interfaith, multicultural immigrant rights organization.

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Our Vision

The New Sanctuary Movement of Atlanta imagines and builds a beloved community crossing borders of faith, ethnicity, and class in our work to end injustices against immigrants regardless of immigration status, practices generous welcome for all, and ensure that values of dignity, justice, compassion, and hospitality are lived out in practice and upheld in policy.

Our Mission

We, people of faith in the dominant culture, as allies working in solidarity with immigrant faith communities in Georgia, seek to build bridges and eliminate borders between our communities. We work together to ensure a more just and welcoming state for all immigrant families by acknowledging our shared values of inclusion, compassion, dignity, community, mutuality, non-violence and democracy.

We will achieve this mission by:

  • Listening attentively to the stories of Atlanta’s immigrant communities and sharing these stories in a variety of contexts in the dominant culture;

  • Offering hospitality and support to immigrants who are at risk for separation from their families and loved ones because of unjust immigration policy;

  • Educating the non-immigrant community (dominant culture) about the complexity of the systemic injustices in the immigration system in Georgia and the root causes of migration;

  • Advocating for humane, compassionate, and sensible public policies and laws which impact the immigrant community and seek to end injustice at the local and state levels of government in Georgia;

  • Organizing and building our membership base of dominant culture and immigrant faith communities to work in tandem and in solidarity for more just immigration policies;

  • Accompanying immigrants in detention and deportation cases;

  • Building an empowered and beloved community of non-immigrant and immigrant faith communities through developing leadership capacity and deepening civic engagement.

Our TeamS

NSMA carries out all of its outreach activities through a team structure. Through the ongoing and planned activities of these four teams, NSMA can effectively deploy volunteer and faith partner contributions. For more information on our projects and how you can volunteer, click here.

For more information on Sanctuary…

Right-click on the link below and choose “Save Link As” to download the official document defining and describing Sanctuary from the Presbyterian Church (USA). It includes a history of sanctuary, biblical references, and more, and could be a valuable resource as your faith community considers taking the next step in getting involved with NSMA.

Sanctuary: A Discernment Guide for Congregations (Presbyterian Church USA - PDF)