There is something about doors. They come in all shapes and sizes, are of different colours and quality. However, they basically have the same functionality of opening or closing an entrance to a space, wherein access can be controlled. This time, I am thinking of a particular door: the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica. A Door which Pope Francis opened to mark the beginning of a Jubilee Year for Catholics; a year he called Pilgrims of Hope. Therefore, the significance of crossing that threshold serves as a reminder that everyone is invited to become a pilgrim in this journey towards God’s kingdom.
At Hope Garden, there is also a door. This door opens not into a grandeur Basilica, but into a small walled garden, a sanctuary in a deprived community of the Inner City in Birmingham. Once a week, it welcomes the members who have come to be involved in the project. Initially, the project was set up to help break down barriers of division in the community, after one asylum seeker woman was spat at by a neighbour. From there, the project evolved, and it became a safe place where people from the community who felt marginalised by the rest of society because of ethnicity, disability or status could come and have a cup of tea, chat, grow vegetables together, and experience the love of God in action.
The members of the Garden are a true representation of how superdiverse the City of Birmingham is. They are from faraway places in Africa, Asia, South America, and also from within the UK. However, what people share in common is their migratory experience. Most of them have crossed geographical boundaries in search of sanctuary, hoping to rebuild their lives in a safe environment. I call them Pilgrims of Hope too.
A few weeks ago, the Garden door opened once again on a Thursday afternoon. Our task that week was a crafter’ s task’: to make baskets for our plants in the spring using nature’s resources and recycled materials. We wandered around the neighbourhood and gathered some fallen sticks from the trees. We then selected the ones that looked similar in size and shape and began the process of assembling them together. We basically followed the seemingly easy instructions from a YouTube video. As always, things were easier said than done!
Yet, the process of making the baskets -aside from being a time filled with giggles, jokes and the occasional frustration- was a wonderful moment of people coming together, working for a common purpose. In that simple act of building something with our hands, the deeper symbolism of the Holy Door echoed quietly inside me: the crossing of thresholds, the coming together of pilgrims, the hope of something new. “We did it!” one of the members exclaimed. And indeed, we had.
Several weeks have passed since our basket-making session. Now, we walk into the garden to check on the progress of our strawberry plants planted in them, hoping that the slugs have not eaten them, and testing our craft’s skills to see whether our baskets are not only environmentally friendly but also weatherproof.
As we continue the journey, we hope. We hope and pray that the fruits of our labour will be more than strawberries: they will be signs of healing and community building. And just like the Holy Door invites pilgrims to cross into something sacred, may our own humble garden door continue to open wide to welcome everyone, everyone, everyone, as Pope Francis famously said.
