Greetings, and I hope that this finds you well today, and in good spirits on this the feast day of Sts. Peter and Paul. Here in Romania we are enjoying sunny but mild weather, and I am now back in Cluj after a 2 week trip to the northern regions of Romania, called "Moldova." I would like to share with you briefly about the trip, as it was most uplifting to me, and I believe that you will find it interesting.
It started with Fr. Iulian and me doing a two-day training seminar on addictions for the local Orthodox clergy in a small city in Moldova called "Saveni." We do these trainings under the "Office of Education" of Patriarch Daniel. It all went quite well, and even the local doctors' group and the mayor's office were attending and asking very good questions.
What was so uplifting to me about this particular training is that two years ago a priest from Saveni had attended a training that Fr. Iulian and I did in the nearby city of Botosani. He has now started counseling alcoholics at a social center which he has started. I saw the fruit of our work in other places as well.
Over that next weekend I attended a three-day conference which was put on by the local AA groups in Suceava, a city in Moldova. I always get invitations to these things, and am happy to attend. We had helped this group get started several years ago, and it is going in a very good way, with about 40 people attending the conference. This was very nice for me, to see old friends, and new ones, knowing that I had some small part in the program's development.
Well, I am saving the best part for last. As most of you already know, Fr. Iulian and I have been working together ever since he came to Cluj to study our project in 2005, and we now both coordinate the national anti-drug program of the Romanian Orthdox Church. In Iasi, he has his own program based on the 12 Step model that we use here in Cluj, and it has worked quite well in Iasi also. What happened that was so nice was that the local recovery group in Iasi, all of whom have been through his program, invited us to attend a meeting with them at a monastery near Iasi. The Abbot of the monastery also attended, it was a very spiritual group meeting. Fr. Iulian, the Abbot, and I were all very taken by the atmosphere and depth of the meetings.
I am going to close for now, I myself do not like to read long emails and this is quite long enough. Thank you for reading about our work.
Please know that you can pass our postings on to others who you believe might be interested in our work.
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I do thank you for your interest in our work, for your support, and most of all for your prayers.
In His Love,
One day at a time,
Floyd & Ancuta Frantz, OCMC Missionaries
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