THE youth homelessness charity DePaul UK has described as “heart-warming” the reunion of one in all its Nightstop service users with two of its hosts, the Rt Revd Mark Bryant, an assistant bishop within the diocese of Newcastle, and his wife, Elisabeth.
Nightstop places people susceptible to homelessness, predominantly young people, into the homes of trained and vetted volunteers living in the neighborhood. Volunteers offer their spare room for the night, a hot meal, washing facilities, breakfast, and a packed lunch within the morning.
Yasmina was just weeks away from graduation when she began living in her automobile outside Newcastle city centre. She received emergency help from DePaul. “I’ll always remember the heat and safety I felt once I stepped into Mark and Elisabeth’s home,” she said. “It wasn’t only a roof over my head: it was the conversations and encouragement that gave me hope, and jogged my memory of my value.”
She describes that point as one in all her most vulnerable. Bishop Bryant, who’s a trustee of the Oasis Community Trust, and his wife, a nurse practitioner, have welcomed almost 100 people susceptible to homelessness into their home over the past decade. Their first experience was hosting asylum-seekers when Bishop Bryant was Archdeacon of Coventry.
He described Yasmina, who’s now living in private accommodation and pursuing a Master’s degree, as “an incredible person. All she needed was a likelihood for somebody to imagine in her.”
On opening their home to strangers, the Bishop said: “I feel it’s a mix of being warm and just helping people to chill out and feel at home. My sense is that, on the primary night, persons are saying, ‘What are the foundations?’ And so it’s about helping them to chill out, telling them gently what happens. I feel that helps to present them some security.”
So does the food: a special first-night dish for his guests is a potato stew with tomatoes, olives, and feta cheese, served with flatbread.
“We’re lucky in our kitchen because they will come and sit there and have a cup of tea with a cake or whatever once I’m cooking, and in the event that they wish to talk, it’s a pleasant space for them to accomplish that. And while I’m cooking we are able to chat,” he said.
Memorable guests over the ten years have included a young man who suddenly found himself within the north-east. “He was a completely lovely young man, but our sense was that he was completely gullible and would have gone with anybody who was nice to him,” Bishop Bryant said. “I used to be very happy we could give him a spot of safety.”
He remembered, too, an older man whose relationship had fallen apart. “He was so deeply ashamed at this that he walked the streets for 3 nights, unable to face telling anybody. Eventually, he gave in, and heard about Nightstop and got here to us for his first night. It was lovely to give you the chance to present him a warm place of security and gently start to construct his self-confidence and self-esteem.”
The Bryants have recently hosted a young Sudanese man who had left Sudan in his mid-teens, travelling to the UK via Libya, Morocco, Tangier, and Italy.
“He had leave to stay, but was homeless, while deeply committed to learning English on the local college,” Bishop Bryant said. “In the center of eating one night, he had a flashback about something on his journey, which for a number of minutes completely overwhelmed him.”
DePaul UK has seen referrals across the Nightstop network rise by 55 per cent prior to now 12 months. Nicola Harwood, its director of services, said: “Yasmina’s story is a testament to the resilience of individuals experiencing homelessness and the life-changing impact of our hosts. But, with demand for Nightstop surging by greater than half, we urgently need more people to step forward and help.”
In a mirrored image for Homelessness Sunday last 12 months, the Bishop suggested that homelessness was not the primary issue for a lot of who got here to hunt help. “Many of those that come are homeless because they’ve often experienced many traumas of their lives,” he said. “Early life has often been difficult, and that has made it difficult as they grow as much as form good and healthy relationships.
“It has meant that life has sometimes turn out to be unhelpfully chaotic, and sometimes the pain of just being alive has been so great that the one approach to dull the pain is thru alcohol or other drugs. Funding or holding down a tenancy has turn out to be simply unattainable. Circumstances have made it harder for them to glimpse that fullness of life which can have come a little bit more easily to others, and which is God’s desire for each member of the human family.”
DePaul UK provides initial training and ongoing support to be certain that its volunteer hosts have the talents and confidence to assist those facing homelessness. It is, the charity says, “for anyone who can offer a spare room and a listening ear to someone in need”.
Bishop Bryant heard about Nightstop at a Synod fringe meeting about teenage runaways. He “got here home, made a phone call, and the remainder is history”. Asked what motivates him, he said: “I might say that we’ve got a spare bed, someone can use it; so it is smart to supply it.”
