CHURCH CONVERTED INTO CARE SHELTER

A Church of Scotland congregation in Edinburgh has converted one of its buildings into a care shelter for rough sleepers. The former Stenhouse St Aidan’s Parish Church building on Chesser Avenue has had a £220,000 refurbishment, including a new extension housing a toilet block and showers, and has been renamed ‘Diadem’.

The emergency accommodation project, which opened on December 21 last year on a trial basis, is a joint venture between Gorgie, Dalry, Stenhouse Church of Scotland and Bethany Christian Trust. It provides a permanent home for Bethany’s Care Shelter, which has hitherto rotated round different churches in the capital. Where previously users of the Care Shelter slept on mattresses on the floor, at Diadem they get a bed.

An average of 60 people, many of whom are ferried there by minibus, have used the facility each night in the first year.

Volunteers from around 70 church congregations in Edinburgh use the kitchen to cook a two-course meal for service users each night. A secondhand clothes bank, which also provides new underwear and sanitary products, is available and a light breakfast is served in the morning.

Representatives from different support services visit the project on a regular basis to offer specialised advice.

Gorgie, Dalry Stenhouse Church building manager, David MacLennan, said: “The feedback from clients has been very positive.

“One lady was literally dancing with joy at the prospect of having the comfort of a bed and a hot shower.”

The Care Shelter closed for the summer in May, but it is hoped that it will reopen permanently in mid-September.

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