I received word from the director of Pathway to Joy Ministries in Romania that an urgent situation has occurred. They were in the process of building a church in the very poor gypsy village of Salbolciu. They had all the money to do it and had just taken it out of the bank to pay for the supplies etc. They had placed the money in a safe in the PTJ office in Oradea, Romania the night before this all happened. Sadly, someone broke into the office and stole all of it…. about $49,000.
Karen Bucur of PTJ says, “The people of Salbolciu have waited two years for a church since hearing the gospel, and we were so excited when we started building this month…right when we were to buy a majority of the construction material, the break in occurred at our office and all the money we had raised for this purpose was stolen…approx $35,000 was for this new church and approx 15,000 was for the orphans at the hospital.”
As I type this, there is an American construction team in Salbolciu. They have the church’s foundation poured, but can do no more. Please pray that enough money can be raised to finish building the church as soon as possible!
The chances of this money being found and returned are slim to none, as the police are doing nothing. The reality In Romania is that all work is done by bribery. No bribe no work. So, in this case no work.
Thank you for your prayers. If you are interested in helping in other ways please contact me. To find out more about the ministry of Pathway to Joy you can visit http://www.pathwaytojoy.org.
On behalf of the the People of Salbolciu,
Melissa
