South African church to evict hundreds of refugees

A woman with her belongings in bags leaves the the dilapidated Central Methodist Church in downtown Johannesburg Wednesday, Dec. 31, 2014. The church has offered shelter for those who fled neighboring Zimbabwe and other troubled African countries, as well as South Africa’s own homeless. Refugees now face eviction from the shelter that has been home to thousands of desperate people over the past 14 years, church officials say they can no longer afford the wear and tear on the building or the water and electricity bills incurred by the refugees. (AP Photo/Denis Farrell) A woman with her belongings in bags leaves the the dilapidated Central Methodist Church in downtown Johannesburg Wednesday, Dec. 31, 2014. The church has offered shelter for those who fled neighboring Zimbabwe and other troubled African countries, as well as South Africa’s own homeless. Refugees now face eviction from the shelter that has been home to thousands of desperate people over the past 14 years, church officials say they can no longer afford the wear and tear on the building or the water and electricity bills incurred by the refugees. (AP Photo/Denis Farrell)

By Associated Press December 31, 2014 4 min read

JOHANNESBURG (AP) – The New Year brings an uncertain future for more than 500 people who are being evicted from the Central Methodist Church in downtown Johannesburg, which has been a haven for refugees and homeless for the past 14 years.

Messages of thanks and praise are scrawled onto the church’s walls, tributes to Bishop Paul Verryn who opened the house of worship to the needy.

In one of Johannesburg’s grittiest blocks, the Methodist church offered shelter to those who fled neighboring Zimbabwe and other troubled African countries, as well as South Africa’s own homeless. Verryn believes the church has the responsibility to be more than a place of worship and to help those new to the city integrate into an unforgiving urban environment.

Verryn’s policy was controversial as the church became a teeming dormitory.

“As many problems as there are, there are just as many of the most incredible people with the most spectacular potential,” says Verryn of those who pass through the church’s front door every day. “It is an exposure into a different way of being church.”