“We can’t separate faith from the things that we do”
This week, we’re heading to Greenbelt – a festival of artistry, activism, and faith, to talk about what we do and share some of the stories of our guests and hosts.
One of those hosts is Andrew, a writer, broadcaster and journalist who, along with his wife, Jane, has hosted with us since 2023, opening their home to guests from Somalia, Uganda, and Iran.
The couple are active in the church and Andrew has been coming to Greenbelt since 1975. For the last few years he’s produced the festival’s Sunday morning service and is set to continue the tradition this weekend.
I first went to Greenbelt 50 years ago; the second one that had ever taken place. I got involved as a teenager in a youth group. Greenbelt has changed massively over the years, and as I’m now heading for my pension, so have I.
Greenbelt is my spiritual home. It’s my happy place. We can’t separate faith from the things that we do. Being a Christian is all about welcoming strangers, providing hospitality, opening homes, taking risks, and valuing individuals.
When the kids left home, we thought, well, we can either downsize, or we could take the opportunity of having spare rooms and open up our home and our family to some other people.
Refugees at Home do as much as possible in terms of briefing people and making sure that things are OK. But there is a moment when somebody comes across the doorstep, and you say “hello, I’m Andrew”, and they say “hello, I’m whoever” and that is the most that you know about them. But there’s an immense privilege in that sense that people trust you in that way.
I think the dog was a bit unsure at the beginning, but he soon got used to the idea and became a really important part of the hosting process for us. Even the one or two guests who were a little bit wary of the dog soon came to see him as part of the family and I think when they leave, they probably miss him more than us!
Sometimes it’s somebody coming for just a couple of nights and some people just want to go into a room and sleep because it’s warm and it’s dry and it’s safe. Some people will stay there for hours or days before they emerge. Some people we get to know well over time, for some people all we do is give them a safe space for a little bit; they just pass through and that’s fine, too.
The joy of hosting is the possibility of meeting people from different parts of the world and having people of different cultures bringing their experiences and sharing them with us, which is just an incredibly enriching and lovely thing to do.
Sometimes people come and they’ve got no English at all. Sometimes we have to explain everything in sign language before we establish ways of talking to each other or using Google Translate, such as explaining how you flush a toilet in England! It’s quite an adventure. But it’s a lovely thing to find ways of communicating with people.
It’s a gift to be hosting for Refugees at Home. It’s as if somebody is on a long, arduous journey on foot. And by hosting you can just provide them with a little staging post with a bed and some food for a few nights as part of a much longer journey that they are going on.
