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February 2007
Dear friends,
OK, this time you have criminals writing to you! I wish I could use quotation marks in that sentence, but unfortunately it is true.
As I already wrote to you in an email we as New Life Moldova have encountered a lot of opposition from the government when sponsoring our biggest student conference of the year. Let me give you the facts again and let you know what happened.
We have rented a camp outside the city and between staff and students had almost 200 people there. Suddenly police came and told us that they have been alerted of a mass event at the camp and demanded explanations. They were asking for a lot of documents, interviewing people, asking a lot of questions, etc. We kept bringing them copies of our registration documents but then they asked for the document from the local town hall permitting us to have such a conference over there in the first place. The law they were referring to was on assemblies and really deals with things like demonstrations, protests, parades, etc and really not an indoor training conference. We know well that such events are conducted all the time by various businesses and no special permit is needed. Then they learned that one of the attendees was a guy from Ukraine who came to give a few talks. Once that has surfaced additional charges have been brought against us. So besides having an unauthorized assembly we were now being charged with having a foreigner conducting illegal religious activities. They kept asking more questions, putting more pressure, having more authorities there. Finally they decided to take us to court the very next day! This was giving us no time to adequately prepare, but we decided to not give anyone grounds to shut the conference down and have complied. BTW, the conference ended up being great. 12 students have made a profession of faith!
Our first trip to the court was quick. The judge very quickly realized that we did not have enough documents with us and granted us a continuance. We came back 3 days later ready to prove that we really did not break any laws but on the contrary everything we do only makes a good contribution to society.
My experience at the court house was a very interesting one. It was clearly across town and considering the fact that it was cold and I was nervous I told Olga to go ahead and go to the judge’s office and I will stop by the WC for a minute. Little did I know, but the court house does not have public bathrooms! I was all over the place looking for one and when Harry Potter finally found the “chamber of secrets” it was locked! I quickly realized that court clerks had a key, so I went looking for the “gatekeeper”. Having been to 4 different offices I was finally told, that the court bathrooms are only for the people “working there”. I guess they are sending a “do not come back” message by such approach. Well, that was only the beginning.
The judge was rude, kept interrupting, coming across very impatient. All this made the hearing very hard for us. Oh, everything I saw in movies was wrong! The judge finally announced a break and told us to come back in a week for a sentence.
Yesterday was the D-day and after a few questions we were told to leave the room and then came back in for a sentence. We were found guilty and sentenced to a fine. The fine is the least of our concerns, really. The more I think about this whole thing the more discouraged I get. Here we are, trying to do everything right, having all of our ducks in a row, paying crazy taxes, investing everything we are into the people of this country, people who are the future leaders and, Lord willing, will help Moldova to finally turn the corner economically and this is the kind of treatment we get...
I have been thinking a lot about the book I read several years ago - “Christian Manifesto” by Frances Shaeffer and have re-read several chapters this morning before writing this letter. I do not want to make a lot of provocative political statements here, but the book does have good points. Unfortunately we do not see too many rulers who consider themselves to be “lieutenants to the One whose eyes watch upon them”...
So, we are going to do what the book says, to “defend ourselves by protest and the employment of constitutional means of redress.” We are going to the appellate court.
We feel like the true freedom of religion is at stake and I do not need to tell you what can happen to a society if this freedom is not being protected. I read another good document today. We too hold that “… these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…”
Please pray for us! We know that the battle - even a legal one really belongs to the Lord!
I could not help but notice another line which I really hope will NOT apply to us. “In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury.”
PS Oh, yeah. I finally did find a public bathroom in the basement. Here is the picture.
From Moldova with love,
Yuri and Olga
February 2007
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