Don't be a stranger

Church and Integration

Filling out forms, negotiating with landlords, even understanding basic English - churches who work with migrants are discovering how huge these obstacles can be for them.

Major David Blowers, from The Salvation Army in Margate, works with Czech and Slovak migrants, particularly Roma.

"Sometimes the problem is simply that they don't speak English well enough to get everything sorted out," he says.

"Sometimes it is a cultural thing or sometimes not understanding the system. We give a lot of advice - filling in forms with them and being around them and being on the streets with them."

The Salvation Army in Margate also offers translation services and holds English classes, a service also offered by numerous other churches and organisations across the country.

The Boaz Trust supports asylum seekers in the North West of England, providing accommodation, getting them in touch with doctors, dentists and solicitors and holding English and IT classes.

Director Dave Smith says: "Asylum seekers hold on to their culture, costume and language very strongly and this makes it more difficult for them to integrate into community.

"Sometimes they integrate well with the British and make friends. This is usually due to opportunities they have had to meet neighbours and with others.

"We try to facilitate opportunities for people to meet together, volunteer or experience something of what England can be like."

In Northern Ireland, across-denominational group of Christians came together in 2001 to found the organisation Embrace, which promotes a positive response to people seeking asylum, refugees, migrant workers and minority ethnic people.

Embrace trains Christians to teach English classes and encourages Christians to help in other practical ways including finding furniture, explaining the rules of the road and organising community groups.

The Reverend Richard Kerr, a Presbyterian minister and Embrace committee member, says: "People's views on refugees and asylum seekers are often more informed by the Daily Mail than the Bible. We try and get Christians to think about their responsibility to the people coming into our communities.

"It is about being welcoming, but not with our eyes closed - we are aware that sometime people do abuse the system."

The Reverend Katei Kirby, Chief Executive Officer of the African and Caribbean Evangelical Alliance, says Black Majority Churches often help out in an informal basis. Pastors will often help with asylum applications and individual church members will give advice to those whose applications are successful on finding a good local doctor or local school, for instance.

"Integration as a welcome is the norm in African and Caribbean churches," she says.

"Apart from the day they arrive, migrants aren't called new - instead, ways are found for them to be included. I think it is very important for churches not to think of migrants in a ‘them and us' way. Perhaps churches should not think so much about how they can integrate or welcome ‘migrants', but how they welcome people full stop."