Combining community, volunteering and cultural activities: a success story for Emmaus Caneças!

Emmaus Caneças has become a leading light in the sociocultural life of the Arroios neighbourhood in Lisbon (Portugal), in particular by hosting international volunteers. Working with the volunteers, the community now arranges one cultural evening a week throughout the year. We talked to Ophélie, the community co-leader, who gave us their recipe for success.

Hello Ophélie!  How did the idea of the community hosting volunteers come about? 

When the community resumed work in 2023, Humberto really wanted to restart hosting international volunteers and make it a key component part of our identity. At the same time, we were offered the chance to occupy a house with a courtyard in the centre of Lisbon for a few weeks: the property is owned by a religious congregation with whom we have an excellent relationship, and they needed to weigh up a project and quickly take over the lease. We turned the property into a shop. And as it had a flat, we hosted foreign volunteers there too! Subsequently, the lease of a few weeks turned into several years. Since 2023, we have hosted over 200 volunteers, as well as roughly 15 students on work placements, community service volunteers, and six Scout troops.

So, the community is spread across Caneças, 15km from Lisbon, and Arroios, a neighbourhood in Lisbon. How do the two locations interact?

Emmaus Caneças is a classic residential Emmaus community. It is home to around 15 companions mostly from Portuguese-speaking countries and Eastern Europe. Sale of collected, repaired and upcycled second-hand goods fully funds the community. The companions are actively involved in the income-generating activity and community life.

In Arroios (Lisbon), the house has been converted into a shop on the ground floor, a flat for the team on the first floor, and a social and meeting space in the inner courtyard. We call it the Pop-Up Emaús Arroios.

In Caneças, the volunteers stay in the community buildings, and take part in all the activities, just like the companions. They stay in the first-floor flat in Arroios.

The companions bring the goods to be sold, but do not work in Lisbon: Eva, supported by the local or international volunteers, runs the premises.

So, you have gradually turned Arroios into a place to meet and socialise? 

Yes, that’s exactly it! Since 2023, we have successfully managed to establish ourselves as a leading light in neighbourhood life. In the first phase, Humberto (splitting his time between the community and Arroios) and I opened the premises, publicised it, and made it available for the different types of activities that we were asked to host. The community’s former leadership team retired in 2025, so Humberto and I took over, and Eva took charge of the Pop-Up; Eva is actually a former Pop-Up work placement student! We are able to arrange cultural events once a week throughout the year with the help of the volunteers. We felt that it was important for the volunteers to carve out a place for themselves, take on responsibility, and get fully involved in our daily lives!

The venue is now regarded as being a real neighbourhood sociocultural hub! We have designed the Pop-Up to be an oasis with three areas:

The Solidarity area, first and foremost, with its second-hand store, which is also a drop-in centre offering social and administrative support for around 15 homeless people. They can have a rest, enjoy a coffee, pick up clothing and blankets, and are directed towards the community.

Then there is the International Volunteering area, with volunteers having the option of staying in the flat located above the shop. They are involved in running the income-generating activity (charity shop) in the day, and run the cultural evenings. This leads us to the third area: culture.

In 2023, when we took over the premises, local young people told us that the neighbourhood lacked cultural venues. As of September 2023, just a few months after taking over the premises, we therefore opened the shop in the evenings and held photography exhibitions, short film festivals, drama productions, sports screenings, music evenings, and so on and so forth.

Local young people can also use the venue to practice their shows (music, drama etc).

So, the cultural area is growing, thanks to the volunteers? 

That’s right, hosting volunteers is inextricably linked to our cultural work. And it is going really well: we now appear in Lisbon’s cultural listings.

We are also working on a new project to future proof our cultural work, and enable young people to really buy into the venue: the Emmaus Music Lab. This project aims to make our venue into a hub for creatives and a place that hosts music lessons, women’s choirs, and enables musicians to play together. It is the logical continuation of what we have patiently built over these years, with local or visiting artists, the neighbours, public institutions, and so on.

What does the neighbourhood think of you? 

We have managed to create a welcoming venue for all age groups and people from all social backgrounds. This lovely venue is unique, and enables people to mix in a very socially and culturally diverse neighbourhood. We are very popular in the neighbourhood.

Anything else you would like to add? 

Welcoming volunteers has helped the community become outward-looking, and develop projects that go beyond the traditional community framework. It also enables us to assure continuity and give responsibility to the next generation; our ethos boils down to “head in the clouds, feet on the ground”.

The whole experience forces Emmaus out of its comforting daily routine, and brings volunteers, who are somewhat lacking experience, into contact with a sometimes-tough real world, enabling them to move beyond theoretical campaigning, and by setting up tangible projects for which they share responsibility with us. It is a rewarding experience for both community stakeholders and volunteers. Most of the volunteers contact us through the Worldpackers platform, and the comments they leave on the platform attest to the rewarding nature of the experience.

Click here to find out all about the Emmaus groups in Portugal.