The Clarion

The Marriage Course & Outreach

During an extended Zoom meeting recently with the only employee of the Moldova Mission Network, our President and Executive Director (both volunteers), reported considerable encouragement and progress. Slavic, our Moldova Country Director, is working such long hours that we needed to caution him not to overdo himself. For example, one morning he got up at 6 a.m., loaded his van with the material for a session for the Marriage Course, then spent four hours driving to the church for the meeting. (That is about as far as you can travel in Moldova.)   After the meeting, he re-loaded everything, and drove home. He arrived back home at 11 p.m.!

Slavic reports that except for last year with the Covid close down, he did not travel his average of 30,000 miles.

Three times during our meeting he told us your donations allowing MMN to supply reimbursement for travel expenses are an answer to his prayer. Gasoline is very expensive in Moldova.

Slavic has planned four weekend village Tent Meetings this summer. You can see pictures and read about these on our new website MoldovaMissionNetwork.org. Look under the Outreach section.

His outreach efforts recently required each couple to bring along a non-Christian couple to qualify for participation! Follow-up with participants of The Marriage Course usually involves regular Bible study. Some studies he and his wife Ala conduct. In other instances, the local pastors do this. With your donations Slavic has been able to rent an office he uses for marriage counseling. There are many troubled marriages in Moldova because of the social and economic situation. One couple had so many problems their counseling session extended until 3 a.m.

Orphan Update

Pitiful and difficult describes the orphan situation in Moldova. It may be the worst situation in Europe.

Under EU pressure there has been a movement since about 2010 to close the orphanages in Moldova and relocate children in foster homes or return them to their homes. Progress has been made in this area. However significant problems remain. The worsening economic situation in Moldova has intensified the struggle of foster homes to have enough money to feed these foster children. In most cases donations for MMN that would have been used for orphans in earlier years are currently used to buy food for foster families. There remains a long-term need for nutritious food to ensure the healthy development of Moldova's foster children.

With the ongoing effort to close orphanages--except for handicapped children--in too many cases children are being sent back to families who are not capable of caing for them. There are situations where an alcoholic father is a single parent, and in such cases the children basically become street orphans looking for food. There is no way to know exactly how many returned children are involved in these sorts of situations, as there is often no organized attempt to do a follow-up check on these families. Recently four pre-teen homeless street children were discovered and placed with a foster family, which now has 13 children, both natural and foster.

There is no central governmental register of foster families. Many of these foster family opportunities are created by Moldova's churches.

All donated funds for orphans will go first to supplying food staples. There has been some discussion about creating a central register system for orphans. An MMN long-range goal is to support financially an orphans’ chaplain as well as a local person to help coordinate foster family and orphan care activity.

What God the Father considers to be pure and genuine religion is this: to take care of orphans

James 1:27

UDG Update

Following the exam period, UDG officially started the second semester of the UDG academic year on January 24. Right from the start, UDG bumped into a few challenges.

Covid-Omicron Impact

By December 1 the number of daily confirmed cases in Moldova dropped below 500.  As of early January, these cases were in the upper 5,000s. All the teaching at UDG was done online through February. Some students manifested flu-like symptoms, and some teachers tested positive for Covid. Teachers Elena and Mariana were supposed to travel in early 2022 to Dushanbe, Tajikistan, to teach for two weeks at the UDG satellite school. This trip was postponed until the second half of February because Elena tested positive. 

Kazakhstan UDG Students

Some number of UDG students are from Kazakhstan; there civil unrest and protests delayed the five students' return to classes. UDG has a satellite school in the city of Shymkent which is not very far from where the riots took place. 

Russian Gas Price Increases 

Another challenge is the ongoing energy crisis Moldova is experiencing. The price of Russian natural gas increased last fall by more than 30% for the final consumer. In February, the price went up again. This has led to a chain reaction with price increases in almost all categories. Food-related expenses in Moldova increased by 35% from last year.

UDG Staff News

Nathanael Longstaff, a young man from the UK, came to UDG in January and plans to stay with UDG for a year. He will be teaching English to our Mission and Social Work students.

Our next newsletter will be an update on the Ukraine impact on Moldova with an opportunity to become involved in solving the problems and helping.