Site Feature: Arts-based Spiritual Care at Surrey Urban Mission

Eva Kwong, Recreational Therapist with Surrey Urban Mission, creating art as part of Art and Spirituality Group.

Arts-Based Spiritual Support at Surrey Urban Mission 

Surrey Urban Mission Society (SUMS) is a shelter and community hub located on the unceded territories of the Coast Salish peoples, in Surrey, B.C..  

With roots as a faith-based community kitchen which started in 1995, SUMS services have expanded to include five housing shelters, a hygiene unit for people experiencing unsheltered homelessness, and one supportive housing development. They sheltered 965 people who were unhoused in 2023.  

In partnership with our Arts for Equity Art and Spirituality research team, SUMS is exploring a new way to nurture belonging and dignity with people who are structurally disadvantaged: through art and spirituality. Creativity is being reimagined as a form of spiritual care. 

The Open Studio Approach 

SUMS open studio model.

Since early 2025, SUMS has been working with the Arts for Equity team to create an arts and spirituality group initiative for their guests. Their initiative is built around an open studio model—a flexible, welcoming space where participants can drop-in, pick-up art materials, and create at their own pace.¹ There’s no need to pre-register, no rigid schedule, and no pressure to produce a certain kind of work. Instead, participants are invited into a space of hospitality and consent. 

By prioritizing agency and choice, the open studio approach challenges the power dynamics often present in shelter life. Staff and guests create side by side, meeting each other as humans rather than within the hierarchies of service provision. 

Sessions in Practice 

Sandi Smoker, Nathan Stein, Abi Broadhurst and Dr. Kendra Rieger at SUMS Art and Spirituality Group.

In Spring of 2025, SUMS engaged in their first Art and Spirituality Group: an 8-week open studio session. The interprofessional team includes Nathan Stein who is the Director of Operations at SUMS, Eva Kwong an occupational therapist, and Abi Broadhurst a graduate student and artist. The team is grateful to Sandi Smoker, a research team member, art therapist candidate, and spiritual care practitioner, who provided guidance for this Open Studio approach.  

The group is now offered four times a year and SUMS guests join the art and spirituality group to make art and meaning on Tuesdays. The themes of the Open Studio sessions are grounded in the seasons and the elements of the AIM spiritual assessment tool. (The Spiritual Assessment and Intervention Model (Spiritual AIM) is a framework used by professional chaplains and other healthcare providers to identify and address a person's core spiritual needs for Meaning and Direction, Self-Worth, and Reconciliation.) 

Each session begins with a gentle welcome and often includes poetry prayers that set a reflective tone. SUMS and Arts for Equity facilitators then introduce a theme, while guests chose their own materials and begin to follow their own intuition in art making. 

In the equity oriented open studio experience, art becomes both a medium for fun and relaxation, alongside

SUMS open studio session as part of Art and Spirituality group.

a safe way to process experiences that may be difficult to put into words, and experience transcendence or a sense of the sacred in their lives.  

Through their art making experience, guests have shared powerful stories that connect with their sense of self, culture and life experiences. These moments illustrate how creativity can awaken memory, identity, purpose, and hope. One participant shared that they returned week after week not just for the art, but for the sense of connection and community. 

Honoring Humanity Through Creativity 

The Art and Spirituality sessions at SUMS demonstrate how something as simple as an open studio can become a profound act of equity. In a setting where people often feel dehumanized and stripped of agency, these sessions affirm that everyone deserves beauty, meaning, and belonging.  

SUMS open studio session as part of Art and Spirituality group.

The initiative also demonstrates the power of partnerships across disciplines - bringing together shelter staff, recreation therapy, spiritual care, expressive art therapy, and research. For SUMS, this is not just about offering a program but about transforming what it means to provide spiritual support in a shelter context. 

Nathan Stein, SUMS Director of Operations and our study site lead, shared that creating spaces where people can reconnect with meaning, community, and their own sense of agency is essential. Surrey Urban Mission believes that every person deserves opportunities not only to survive, but to thrive. This Art and Spirituality project has offered a fruitful way to do just that. 

Going Forward 

We are honoured that Arts for Equity has received an SSHRC Insight Grant to deepen this important work around using art and spirituality to promote equitable care at three social services sites over the next few years, including Surrey Urban Mission. 

SUMS Art and Spirituality Site Team: 

Nathan Stein – Director of Operations, Study Site Lead 

Eva Kwong – Recreational Therapist with Fraser Health  

Abi Broadhurst – Artist, Masters Student at TWU 

Flavia Ciona - Research Team Member, TWU