A letter from Burkhard Paetzold in Germany
December 16, 2009
Blessings to you for Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany,
Looking back on 2009, I’m grateful for so many blessings. In my personal life I was able to see our children’s families grow and happy to share time with our grandkids. Our third grandchild, Marisa, was born when I was travelling in Lithuania last February, and she is as alert and enjoyable as Cecilia (5) and Milan (2).
I have now added Lithuania to my work as a regional liaison. With this comes an important partnership with the LCC International University and wonderful mission workers. And I’m glad to see that Central and Eastern Europe were the focus of many mission programs this past year. Presbyterian Women had already kicked things off with Global Exchange 2008. Personal contacts between women during this trip in the Czech Republic, Hungary and Carpath-Ukraine have flourished, and several women from those countries attended the PW Gathering in Louisville last summer, including (for the first time) a Roma woman from Hungary.
Aranka (center), a Christian Roma woman from Debrecen, Hungary, meets Lakota Christians at the Presbyterian Women’s gathering in Louisville, July 2009.
Presbyterian Women and the Diakonie of the Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren helped me revitalize our relationships with Reformed Christians in Romania. The wonderful commitment of PW gave me both support and inspiration. PW is now forging ahead with a self-supporting, basket-weaving project among Roma women and supplies for clean drinking water for Roma women and families in Carpath-Ukraine.
A Reformed woman from Ukraine recently shared with me that it was an eye-opener for her to see that the visiting women from PC(USA) were “caring for the environment and are not ignorant.” Since the United States wastes more energy and resources per capita than any other country, many people assume that all U.S. citizens care little about the environment. Hence, the surprise that American citizens would care for the environment at all. And, because U.S. foreign policy is so dominant in many areas of the world, the assumption is widespread that citizens are ignorant as well.
For me, I’m glad that many Eastern Europeans were given the opportunity to learn that PC(USA) members are different and that U.S. congregations were able to learn about Christians from Central and Eastern Europe. This sharing and learning happened in 2009 through a program called “Mission to the U.S.A.” administered by the Synod of the Covenant. European guests were amazed by the gap between poor and rich. One of the participants told me that host Presbyterian churches “make a big effort to meet needs of poor people by providing them with food” and “support Family Promise programs for homeless families with children. All people are treated with love, respect and dignity.”
On the other hand, one Presbyterian host said: “As Americans we tend to be very ethnocentric and nationalistic, and as a result, we are sometimes uncritical of our culture and our nation. [...] Our guest challenged me several times to view my culture in a fresh und new way through the eyes of someone who lives and pastors in a small village in Eastern Europe.”
Burkhard meets with a Slovak Presbyterian church in Linden, New Jersey, during World Mission Challenge in October 2009.
I travelled for several weeks in Huntingdon, Lehigh and Elisabeth presbyteries during the PC(USA)’s World Mission Challenge in September and October. I had wonderful experiences and exceptional hosts.
As we talked about life-changing experiences I learned again about the amazing volunteer work of many church members and their commitment to local and international mission. And I was happy for the opportunity to share my own view that peaceful change is possible. Just 20 years ago, a peaceful revolution was initiated in my own country (East Germany) by many of us praying in our churches for peaceful change. During my travels in the States, I listened to a German radio station on the Web. I heard a former communist official say, “We had been prepared for everything but candles and prayers.”
I wish you a blessed New Year 2010 with many encouraging experiences of peaceful change.
Burkhard
The 2009 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 175
