Is it someone fleeing a tyrannical regime, a person to be rescued from an over-loaded, sinking boat?Or is it a would-be beneficiary of UK job opportunities, someone to be discouraged from coming to our crowded island?
A refugee in need of sanctuary and asylum . . . or a migrant in search of a better life?
These definitions, and the resulting questions, have come strongly to the fore in the build-up to the EU Referendum.
We oscillate between compassion and caution . . . from offering help, to pulling up our national drawbridge.
But who are they, these thousands of people in transit across Europe? Wouldn't you agree that, by and large, we tend to focus on what separates us . . . language, gender, religion, colour . . . whilst ignoring what unites?
Amnesty International has released a video that goes to the heart of this emotive issue.
When watching it, what do we find? We find precisely what the phrase itself foreshadows . . . we find a heart.
And it's a heart that reveals itself through personal eye-to-eye contact, through feelings
Click here to share this deeply moving, five-minute demonstration.A refugee . . . or a migrant?
Neither . . . we encounter a person.
"People will forget what you said," wrote Maya Angelou, "people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."
