The transformative potential of ad extra work

Despite the above differences, data from both guests and volunteers unveiled the potential of cold weather shelters to act as an ad extra expression of Christianity in local neighbourhoods. As such, we were also aware of their potential as bridges between ad intra church activities and the outside world in a global city. What was striking were the complex ways in which volunteers described the relation of their ad intra/ad extra ecclesial practices. One female volunteer below, for example, identifies a clear distinction and even disconnect between the ad intra and ad extra witness of her church. In addition, she articulates a strong commitment and sense of responsibility to tackling local injustice in Islington and doing the ‘Lord’s work’. This is a practical ecclesiology being wrestled with in action:

I’ve had people [from the church] saying to me: ‘Thank God you are doing this. This is what we should be doing’. People do feel that this is what church should be.... we are a high Anglican Church with a lovely sung Mass and not much else - so through no fault of anyone, we have become more and more insular. So people are enjoying that opening up of the doors.... Almost everybody that I have come into contact with doing this work ... have had their attitudes to the homeless seriously changed.... I have lived in Islington all my life for about 40 years and I have always felt very angry that the community is so polarised.... I do feel very privileged to be alive on this earth, and I

Housing Justice 163 can only call it muscular Christianity, it’s what the Good Lord put us on the earth to do.

(Matilda, Volunteer Focus Group One)

What we saw were vivid examples of volunteers experiencing something transformative in their work with the Shelter. Above all, a powerful operant theology of compassion, and coming alongside those on the margins of society was being embodied:

When I first came here, there was this guy called X who was an alcoholic, he smelt, he was dirty, he had bad feet, he couldn’t walk properly, he almost had his toes cut off and he was sitting here one Sunday and he was just telling me this story of how he was married but he’d split up, and he had a puh and that was taken away from him and I sat their looking at this guy who was in his 40s but looked like he was in his 70s, and I got up and hugged him and he said, ‘Do you know what, it’s the first time I’ve been hugged in 8 years’. It was so touching. Just that physical contact. I don’t even know why I’d done it. A couple of years ago, I would never have done it, you know, go up to a total stranger who smelt and had no teeth in his mouth. That didn’t mean anything to me. I just had to hug him. That just sums it all up for me. It’s lovely.

(Margaret, Volunteer Focus Group One)

Is there any impact on your own faith or spirituality?

It makes my faith stronger definitely just because you see humanity expressed so overtly here.

(Jonny, Volunteer Focus Group One)

This volunteer went on to draw links with the wider community and the church, which had arisen through the work of the Shelter:

Then you look at the link with the local pub which brings a really nice joint of beef and organic juices over, and the local parishioners who bring over the most amazing puddings.

There are strong parallels to be drawn here with findings from LJVs (Account of Practice A above). Social justice volunteering, when fully integrated with the Christian tradition (and this is the challenge), can bring a wholesome and healthy sense of mission to the local church and the local community. The transformative power of these practices were not restricted to the volunteers, or the guests, but had an effect beyond their immediate locus of practice, within their wider church communities and beyond.