The Key He Never Stopped Carrying

For 77 years, Australians have gathered around the Christmas Bowl as one way of putting faith into action — standing alongside local partners and communities working towards peace.
Story by Carmen-Lee Meyers, Act for Peace

For most of his life, Layal’s grandfather kept a key.

It belonged to the home he left behind in Palestine when his family was displaced in the 1940s. They thought they would be gone for only a few weeks.

Weeks became years. Years became decades.

Still, he kept the key, hoping that one day he would return and open the door again.

He never did.

Layal grew up in Lebanon carrying this family history. Then, in 2024, displacement became part of her own story when an airstrike destroyed the home she shared with her husband, Ibrahim, and their three-year-old daughter, Lia.

When they returned, almost nothing remained.

Yet amid profound loss, community remains. Through the ACT Alliance, Act for Peace supports local organisations providing practical assistance to families affected by conflict and displacement.

Across the border in Jordan, another Palestinian family carries their own story of displacement.

Awatif was born into a refugee family after her parents fled Palestine. Today, she lives with her family in Jerash Camp.

For years, making ends meet was difficult. Through the Forsa program, Awatif has built a home-based embroidery and craft business. Her son has received training and found employment, while her daughters are developing skills and imagining possibilities for their own futures.

Layal and Awatif’s experiences are different. Yet beneath their stories are hopes we all understand.

To feel safe. To live with dignity. To provide for those we love. To build a future. To have a place to belong.

At Christmas, these hopes take on particular meaning.

Christians gather to remember the birth of Jesus — a story of God drawing near to us in all the vulnerability of human life. It is also a story of a family seeking shelter and, soon afterwards, fleeing violence for safety.

For 77 years, Australians have gathered around the Christmas Bowl as one way of putting faith into action — standing alongside local partners and communities working towards peace.

This Christmas, Layal’s grandfather’s key offers us a powerful image to hold onto: a key carried for decades because home still mattered. Because belonging still mattered. Because hope remained.

The Christmas Bowl invites us to stand alongside people carrying that same hope today.

For more information around the work Act for Peace supports through the Christmas Bowl, visit https://christmasbowl.actforpeace.org.au/