Open Homes is a multi-church network supporting refugee claimants by offering home-based hospitality.
Open Homes Toronto is designed with multiple layers of engagement. It takes a community to welcome a refugee claimant well! The Host, the Refugee Guest, the Companions and the Open Homes leadership team each have roles to play.
Host
A Host is someone who has chosen to provide temporary accommodation to newly arrived refugee claimants in Hamilton, and who has been carefully screened by our leadership team.
➔ A Host can be an individual or a family.
➔ Ideally Hosts are connected to one of our partner local churches
Guest
A Guest is a newly arrived refugee claimant who has accepted the offer to stay in a private home and to participating in the Open Homes Toronto program.
We welcome Guests of all kinds. We can’t wait to meet you and accompany you on your settlement journey.
Companion
Companions are people who are volunteering to provide practical and relational support to the refugee claimants who are staying in an Open Homes host home.
Open Homes Team
The Open Homes Team is the team of people providing leadership and oversight to the network of Hosts, Companions, Guests, and churches that is known as Open Homes Toronto. Each circle of volunteers (Kinship Circle) is led by a member of our team (Kinship Circle Leader).
We want to create communities of belonging with refugee claimants. We need each other! As anyone who has been to one of our gatherings knows…we love to be together. The Kingdom of God is a big diverse party, and we want to taste some of that now.
Our Kinship Circle Leaders have experience and expertise in the Canadian immigration system and will help ensure that refugee claimants have access to the information and community resources available to help them navigate the refugee claim and settlement process. They lead circles of volunteers (Kinship Circles) in welcoming new Guests.
To learn more, please send us an email.