Calvin Synod Herald, 2007 (108. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
2007-11-01 / 11-12. szám
8 CALVIN SYNOD HERALD TRAC Update Report Christian Friends: At the end of each season of working in the Diaspora villages in the Mezöség (field area), north and east of Kolozsvár (Cluj), the students take a week to go out into the villages, live with the people there, visit in their homes, hold special worship services and Bible classes for the children, with all leading up to a final combined worship service and conference for the people in one central place. Of this year’s Summer Mission, we have this report: The Summer Mission was held this year between July 8-15 in the villages of Feketelak, Kispulyon, Gyeke, Cege, Szentegyed, Góc, Oroszfaja and Komlod. Ten students were involved in this Mission, who visited the families and held the children s program and daily church services. Also, on Thursday, Jenő Lako went to the homeless and distributedfood packages for the last time this summer, and then continued the homeless mission on the first week of October. The church conference this year was at Oroszfája, where people from Komlód, Orosyfája, Királzfalva and Meyőörménzes gathered together. On the Sunday service, Bishop Géza Pap preached. After the service and Holy Communion, the people went to the community building for lunch. During the lunch, the Bishop talked with the people and they were very pleased because the last time a Bishop had even been to Oroszfája was in 1927. After the lunch, the Szikra-ensemble played and sang religious songs for the congregation. After that, Török Csingó Adorján, a student, sang a few folk songs and we sang together a few of our own too. In the afternoon, we came back to Cluj and we went to a restaur4ant for evaluating the summer trip. Everybody’s opinion was that this summer mission was very encouraging - not just for the people and the congregations but for us too. We would like to thank you, not onlyfor yourfinancial support but for your prayers. Without this, our work would be useless. Soli Deo Gloria! Yours sincerely, David Sipos Things are changing in Transylvania and our work with the seminary students is beginning to bear fruit. The young men who have worked with TRAC are now taking up work with the kind of people for which the TRAC program has prepared the. No one explains the needs of these villages better than Krisztián Barticel in the letter that follows this message. Krisztián worked closely with us for several years, directing the village ministry; and now that he is an ordained pastor, he is working in several villages with the hope of reviving the physical and spiritual life of the believers there. Meanwhile, Zsolt Farkas, the student who started and ran the homeless aid program for several years, has been working in another district among poor couples that are moving out of the city into the villages. He is now ordained and appointed pastor of a new congregation seeking a better life spiritually and physically for their children. Both of these young men have two goals: The one is to find the immediate means for the children to travel to the nearest Hungarian school where they can be taught in their traditional language and the Reformed faith. Th3e other is a more long-term goal, as they seek to develop the means by which these young couples can provide an adequate living for their families, educate their children, and maintain their Reformed heritage into the years that are to come. These are goals we have envisioned for many years, and we pray that we may be able to support them in these worthy projects. For TRAC, Bernard J. Woudenberg For more information about the Transylvania Reformed Assistance Committee, contact the TRAC offices at 6970 Bauer Road, Hudsonville, Michigan 49426, Phone: 616-667-1940. Diaspora Schools In recent years, the Hungarian Reformed people have been building Diaspora centers, schools, and dormitories so we can educate our children. The problem is transporting our children to these schools. We now have 8-10 buildings, but we are not sure our children will be in them. For the parents who need to send their children, it is often impossible to pay the expenses. The dormitories are supported by the government, but only minimally. It is not important to the Romanian government to support Reformed Hungarian children since they consider these schools and dormitories to be private or church businesses. They feel the only organization that should support these centers is the Reformed Church, but it has its own material difficulties. So even if it has an interest in these schools, it does not have the ability to help. This leaves it to the parents to pay the expenses. They would do it, but they cannot afford it either. There are no jobs in the villages and the only other income is from agriculture, but very few families can make enough money from this. The markets are too far to get to with horse-drawn wagons (Cluj 65 km, Gheria 45 km, Dej 65 km). There is only one bus and that is not suitable for transporting produce. So the people work for themselves to raise basic food for their families. The only cash income is grandparents’ pensions, which is generally about $50 per month for a former commune worker. From this meager income, they have to pay for electricity, wood for heating their homes, plowing and other farm expenses. Parents get about $15 per month from the government for each child which is not even enough for their personal needs. They may raise about $60-70 if they have a cow, but they need it for their basic living expenses. The result is that they cannot afford school and dormitory expenses, so that they let their children go to the next village school, which is Orthodox Romanian, supported by the state, and free, including transportation.
