Community, Walls and God
The Revd Prof Dr Otniel Ioan BUNACIU
Dean of Facultatea de Teologie Baptistă, University of Bucharest
Abstract: Community, Walls and God represents an inquiry in and a reflec-
tion on the service and witness of a local community of Romanian Bap-
tist believers (Providence Baptist Church). The church has responded to
the need of the Roma community which surrounds it and to a vision to
serve this community addressing one of their needs in a direct way. Af-
ter 22 yeas of service a theological reflection is being a;empted based on
a study of the community done by the University of Bucharest.
Since the interaction between Roma and Romanian communities
in this way is not usual part of the reflection is intended to serve as a
starting point for a dialogue that might lead to further developments es-
pecially based on the way a local community which sometimes has simi-
lar needs decides to help a poorer group because of their faith and
values.
Keywords: Roma, qualitative research, narrative theology, ecclesiology,
ethnography, Baptist, Ferentari
Ephesians 2:11 Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh,
called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, which is made in
the flesh by hands — 12 remember that you were at that time separated from
Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the
covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13 But
now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near in the
blood of Christ. 14 For he is our peace, who has made us both one, and has bro-
ken down the dividing wall of hostility, 15 by abolishing in his flesh the law of
commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in
place of the two, so making peace, 16 and might reconcile us both to God in one
body through the cross, thereby bringing the hostility to an end. 17 And he
came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were
near; 18 for through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19 So
then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens
with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built upon the founda-
tion of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21
in whom the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in
the Lord; 22 in whom you also are built into it for a dwelling place of God in the
Spirit.
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About walls and contextI come to this discussion as a practitioner first, secondly as a min-
ister and only thirdly as a theologian. In spite of being a theologian it
was seeing the need in the local community after an outsider pointed it
out to me, which made me hear a call to become socially involved. I
started to recognize this as God’s call as my personal involvement grew
more. The congregational context I come from in Romania considers that
the way we live our lives as believers relates somehow to how we under-
stand and use Scripture. This is not to say that things always happen like
that but there is a desire, an intention and an a;empt to live by that rule
or conviction. Theology in a Baptist church in Romania starts with Scrip-
ture and then it moves to trying to understand how that affects our lives
as people and as communities. This means that when reading the verses
in Ephesians 2 it makes us think of real walls. The text speaks about the
dividing wall between Jews and Gentiles and about how this old divi-
sion can be transcended by a new community, which is the church. Such
and understanding urges our present community of believers to find
ways to overcome our own walls. In the congregation believers are “fel-
low citizens with the saints and members in the household of God”. The
transformation that takes believers from “then” to “now” is paralleled
by the move from “far” to “near”. This is done through Christ’s achieve-
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39
ment but in a Trinitarian flow. We learn that through Christ “we both
have access in one Spirit to the Father” and we are told that in Christ be-
lievers joined in the church form “a dwelling place of God in the Spirit”.
As a pastor of a local church and as a theologian trying to under-
stand what the life of faith in a church fellowship means, this text also
challenges me to try and understand how being church can become the
presence of Christ which is able to brake down our dividing walls.
Therefore, my reflection is about very practical concerns related to the
ministry of a local church in its community.
In 2013 in the city of Baia Mare in Transylvania, Catalin Cherech-
es the local mayor decided to build a 1.8 m high wall around a Roma
community1. This was a particularly poor slum area where people lived
in make shift housing or in decaying communist blocks. The official rea-
son for the wall was that it would keep the Roma children safe from
wandering on the busy road that ran between this housing complex and
the rest of the city. In fact, the mayor was trying to isolate the Roma
community from the wider population who saw them as a threat and as
an unwelcome presence.
1. h;p://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2285796/Romanian-gypsies-living-condemned-ghe;o-mayor-built-wall-around.html
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That particular story brought back to me a memory from when I
was twenty years old. In November 1979 the English rock band Pink
Floyd released an album called The Wall2. Romania was a communist
state at the time and for us a lot of the western music was difficult to ob-
tain as it came from the capitalistic societies of the west which were try-
ing to corrupt the communist ideologies of the Soviet ear countries. We
were to be protected from the west by all kinds of walls and the most fa-
mous of all was the Berlin Wall3. However, because of the progressive
nature of its music Pink Floyd was well known in our country and there
were various ways to obtain their music. The Wall however came was not
easy to understand and it came as a surprise for me. I remember strug-
gling to understand the words of the song while listening to it on the ra-
dio, as my English was not good enough. I was especially puzzled by the
one of the songs: Another brick in the wall. The second part of that song
became rather famous for the well-known words:
We don't need no education
We don’t need no thought control
No dark sarcasm in the classroom
2. h;p://www.pink-floyd-lyrics.com/html/the-wall-lyrics.html
3. h;p://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/berlin-wall
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Teachers leave them kids alone
Hey! Teachers! Leave them kids alone!
All in all it's just another brick in the wall.
All in all you're just another brick in the wall4.
Pink Floyd thought of “the wall" as being some sort of self-isolat-
ing barrier and the "bricks in the wall" are the people and events that
turn us inward and away from others. Personally, at the time, I was very
puzzled that education was seen in the west as being thought control.
We all considered in the east that the western world was free and open
and therefore the words were dissonant with our understanding of west-
ern society which we could not experience.
Although I was raised as a Christian believer in an education sys-
tem that was very controlling and promoted communism against other
ideologies and especially against Christianity most of us thought of edu-
cation as a way of liberating ourselves from the very thought control that
the authorities were trying to impose through it. It was a lack of an
awareness that we tend to understand things contextually through the
lenses of our culture and experience. In fact, in 1980 in the Cape Town
Townships of Elsie's River and Ravensmead the same song was under-
4. Ibid.
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42
stood and used as a liberation song by students who held a demonstra-
tion to commemorate the four-year anniversary of the Soweto uprising.
As a result, the South African government banned the song at the time.
A friend from Sweden sent us recently at Project Ruth an article
from a publication called Expressen. The name of the article is: That is why
the beggars come and it was published on the 29th of November 2015 and
it is part of a series articles describing the life of Roma in Romania. The
story is wri;en by a journalist from Expressen, who spent 7 weeks in an
urban ghe;o in Ferentari, Bucharest which is where our church is locat-
ed. According to her, the particular street she is describing which is
called, Aleea Livezilor is an “alley of hell where people leave from to go to
Sweden to steal. Others wait to be carried away in a coffin. In fact they are all
dead already. Their hearts beat and they walk through the rubbish trying to
fight their demons, but in fact they are already dead. It is only that each one has
a different timing and a different although equal suffering to get there. This is
the destination which is the only way that leads out of the Allea Livezilor:
death”.5
Whether it may be a concrete wall, or it is alienation, or discrim-
ination in various forms or whether is the threat of death, walls seem to
5. h;p://www.expressen.se/nyheter/longread/darfor-kommer-tiggarna/ro/
livezilor-bukarest--en-plats-for-de-levande-doda/
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have a close and defining relationship with community. In communist
years we loved the warm and close fellowship that the walls raised by
society enabled us to have. Walls provide protection but also generate
estrangement. Providence Baptist Church in Ferentari is such a commu-
nity that exists among walls. It is a Romanian community among Roma
people. It is a poorer community in the capital city of Romania, which is
the wealthiest city in the country. It is a community of Baptist believers
in a country where the large majority belong to the Orthodox Church. It
is tempting to think that the story of Project Ruth is the story of how this
community was called to deal with its walls. However, the Ephesians
text gives a further and more positive call, which is to become for those
it serves, Christ’s holy temple, which is a dwelling place of God in the
Spirit.
Project Ruth The initiative to start Project Ruth came in 1992 through Provi-
dence Baptist church in the Ferentari district of Bucharest. This is located
in the fifth district of Bucharest, which is a city with about 2 million in-
habitants6. The district has 271,575 inhabitants and the larger neighbor-
hood area where the church is located had about 90,000 inhabitants. As
6. According to the 2011 census there were 1,883,425 inhabitants in Bucharest.
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44
was evident from the article in the Swedish paper, Ferentari is consid-
ered one of the poorest areas of the city and also one with the highest in-
cidence of crime. This criminality is generally a;ributed to the large
presence of Roma people. Providence Baptist Church was the first
church of any denomination established 90 years ago in the district. Cur-
rent membership is 300 with 200 in regular. Although the church is locat-
ed in an area with many Roma people these do not a;end the church. A
daughter church was established some years ago at the request of some
Roma who wanted to be in fellowship with our church but desired sepa-
rate services. About 3 or 4 Roma families a;end the main church but
these have abandoned Roma traditions and have adopted “Romanian
ways. In the area are several other Orthodox churches and a few Evan-
gelical churches as well. Interestingly enough official statistics (data ob-
tained from a World Vision study) found, that only 27,322 Roma in
Bucharest and only 7,980 Roma in the entire fifth district. The low num-
bers that are reported are explained by the fact that the Roma themselves
tend to avoid declaring that they are Roma because of the stigma that is
a;ached with such an identity.
The initiative to start Project Ruth came as a result of a challenge
brought by a missionary from the US who was a member of our church.
With the help of volunteers from the church a day center was organized
and for several years the activities were informal, similar to a club or a
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45
day center. The name Project Ruth was given by the young people of the
church because they thought that Ruth was accepted as a foreigner
among the people of God. The project grew in time and today it is one of
the larger Roma Projects in Bucharest and probably in Romania.
The main activities of Project Ruth reflect the needs of the com-
munity and currently these include: Education - The Ruth School is an ac-
credited school in the Romanian educational; Food - Project Ruth pro-
vides a daily meal for all the children with the intention to address basic
needs of good nutrition; Hygiene and health - Hygiene and health is an
important focus for Project Ruth and is lead by family doctor and a
nurse; Humanitarian assistance - Project Ruth tries to find partners to help
support children and their families cope with their situations; Leadership
formation and equipping - Project Ruth has engaged Roma communities
through churches by providing leadership training especially in the
Gypsy Smith School. This provides training in a 2 year long program;
Counseling and job training for women – In the Roma culture women have
an inferior social status and are frequently abused. Project Ruth started
the Naomi Center which operates a counseling program for women and
a sewing club where women can learn how to sew and also produce
things that we try to help them sell; Community development - In an effort
to develop good relationships with the Roma communities various pro-
grams are developed o build trust and avert suspicion and lack of inter-
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46
est by involving parents in information exchanges and in discussion is-
sues of general interest like drug use, trafficking and unemployment;
Advocacy and Resource center - Project Ruth is involved in advocacy and
also in developing a resource center in which the experience gained is
made available to those working in similar communities; Witness - The
main work of Project Ruth is to address the needs of those who live in
the area where our church is located and mainly the needs of the Roma
community. However serving those in need Project Ruth has also be-
come a witness for the presence of Christ in our area.
Impact studyAfter 22 years of practical involvement by addressing the needs
of the area where the church is located we decided that it would be a
good idea to see what impact we actually have through what we do. A
research network was set up which included: Providence Foundation
(the legal parent of Project Ruth), The Faculty of Sociology and Social
Work, The Faculty of Baptist Theology, The Centre for Research and In-
novation in Social Services and The Centre for Faith and Culture. The
qualitative study was conducted between August and October 2014. The
research methodology included two major components. The first one
was researching of standards and legislation. The second component
was the qualitative evaluation itself, which was based on semi-struc-
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47
tured interviews, which were applied both to beneficiaries and to the
specialists involved in the work. Focus groups were also organized both
with beneficiaries and community leaders. Interviews and focus groups
were led by trained researches from the Sociology and Social Work Fac-
ulty. The results were discussed and assessed by the two research
centers. The evaluation focused on the social needs of the community to
which the beneficiaries belong.
From the data, which resulted from the qualitative research, I col-
lected the responses of those involved to which I added responses from
financial supporters and church members obtained in separate surveys.
Beneficiaries“… When I came to Ferentari, believe me that it is like moving in the
jungle. What I saw there for me … was science fiction! I locked myself inside
with the children, stuff like that… you could hear screams and cries on the hall
way, wooooo …. crazy … I thought I cannot not survive there. All this time I
tried to protect the children as there were all kind of wretched people and drugs
on the streets. What could I offer to that child? Is this education? Then I heard
about this school. And I thought that this is my opportunity to move children
further”.
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“I do not know if God was the one who … (laughs). I was looking for a
kindergarten but I did not know about the Ruth School. I was walking on the
street and someone told me: if you are looking for a kindergarten there is one
run by the repented ones. I came here with Miss. Angela”.
“The Foundation also helped me in the second year, they paid for half of
the cost for my nursing school. With three children that was very important for
me (mother 44, 3 children)
“I was depressed and for a year I went only to the counseling center …
after that year I started to go to the sewing workshop and my life changed a lot
because I started to have more confidence…” (mother 26, 2 children)
The Ruth School is perceived as a Christian school although it is
not registered as such. The help offered to those in need is perceived by
some of the beneficiaries as a form of Christian witness. Some parents
claim that Christian values promoted in the school ensure the more suc-
cessful social integration of the children. Parents are aware of risks their
families would be exposed to if Project Ruth would not exist. Some bene-
ficiaries seem to believe that they are entitled what the charity offers dai-
ly and want to receive more resources. Lack of money is a big problem
and has lead some to be in debt. Many are in a desperate situation and
are grateful for the help.
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Specialists “Providence Foundation has knowing in its 20 years an intelligent and
sustainable development based on a vision grounded in the needs of the benefici-
aries. It existed in the midst of the needs of the people, close to their suffering
gaining in this way organizational maturity and strategic for the community”.
(DB, 158)
Specialists pointed out that Project Ruth became a good model of
church involvement in the needs of society by responding to a vision of
service. This was developed over more than two decades of involvement
with the needs of the community.
Church members:“Project Ruth represents the work of the church in the hearts of children
and parents”. (John, 41-55)
“Project Ruth is the fingerprint of the church not only in Ferentari or
Romania but internationally too”. (George, 25-30)
“Project Ruth is the living proof of the impact, which a community of
believers can have in society, thus making Providence Church an international
model of involvement. Through Project Ruth, Providence Church shows the
world God’s love, and care taking of our neighbor”. (Peter, 18-24)
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“The church fulfills its vocation: its witness is strengthen, the church
proves a real concern for the need of the neighbor”. (Mark, 31-40)
“Project Ruth is the chance to practice biblical principles of serving the
community in the midst of which we are located”. (31-40)
Church members indicated that Project Ruth represented a vehi-
cle through which the work of the church brought international visibili-
ty, it represented God’s fingerprint, was in fact the vocation of the
church fulfilling her biblical mandate and a living proof of its presence.
Supporters:“What you are doing for the people of Romania is awesome. I taught in
a room in the school and saw daily the hand of God. You are a tremendous tool
for Jesus and it is a joy to share in your ministry in a small way” (Minister in
the USA. 60).
“Project Ruth is very relevant especially for the XXI century. We all
know that education is the way out of poverty and for breaking the cycle of
poverty. What started 20 years ago with the church’s aqempt to help a few poor
Roma children grew into a program that that changes lives and it is larger than
we dreamed. I have come to Ferentari since 1997 and the changes are transfor-
mational not only about buildings and roads but also people”. (Nancy)
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Sponsors noted that they can see the hand of God in a local
church effort that has grown significantly and it is transformational.
Trying to make sense of the presence of church incommunity
In his article in Perspectives on Ecclesiology and Ethnography
(Ecclesiology, Ethnography and God) Nicholas Healy asks the question:
why community? He notes that trying to understand what motivates a
local church in becoming involved in the community where it exists is
what Rowan Williams describes as beginning “always in the middle of
things”7. Having said that as I a;empted to think through what our
church does from that vantage point I discovered that things are rather
messy and therefore they are difficult to understand or at least it is prob-
lematic to try and describe what is going on without imposing some ex-
ternal ordering which may not reflect in fact the complex situation on
the ground but an understanding of it.
After that Healy quotes David Martin’s claim that forms of com-
munitarian ideology propagated by mainstream religions “do not con-
7.Rowan Williams, On Christian Theology, (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), p. xii.
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52
form to any reality” and are “based on delusions”8. I am not sure that the
description is a helpful one for Romania.
If we agree that the model of Trinitarian relationships can form
the basis of understanding the Christian community as participating in
the movements in God one of the questions that needs to be asked is
how does the person relate to earthly community. I found it helpful to
reflect on this by starting from the four pastoral concerns that Paul Fid-
des raises in his book Participating in God9. The first one is the distinction
between person and personage. This relates to how we can communicate
with the person who is beyond the mask of the personage. As we are not
able to remove the mask of our own personage “like a coat or suit of ar-
mor”10 the encounter with the person of another remains somewhat
mysterious. The concern is therefore how to deal with the discord be-
tween the personage and the person even if this effort takes place in the
often reductionist understanding that communities have “a grammar”
or rules for living. In the context of our community the so-called gram-
mar is not shared between communities that otherwise share the same
8. David Martin, Reflection on Sociology and Theology, (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1997), p. 131.
9. Paul Fiddes, Participating in God, (London: Darton, Longman, Todd, 2000),
p. 19.
10. Ibid. p. 21.
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physical space. One of the ongoing difficulties is how to be a Romanian
and a practicing Christian in a section of town with a fairly large Roma
population of whom most consider themselves to be Christians although
they do not practice their faith . What our research seems to indicate is
that social involvement provides a way to look beyond the personage
from both directions by providing an openness towards the others.
The second concern is the balance between the integrity of the
self and openness to others. Paul Fiddes calls this as being uniquely-cen-
tered without being self-centered. He starts from Pannenberg’s concept
of the open person11 to remind us that humans are born with an open-
ness to the world illustrated by the relationship of trust to the mother. In
time this openness is eroded as the self closes itself in defense of others
by gathering everything in an ego center. It is in the tension between the
self and the ego understood in Pannenberg’s way that Fiddes sees the
challenge. If we really want to help others we need to understand our
own needs otherwise we will not be aware of the self-interest that might
motivate our efforts. He goes on to write about Campbell’s12 idea that
one needs to be prepared to be with others by finding God’s presence in
others and by practicing solitude in order to be grounded in God by re-
11. Wolyart Pannenberg, What is man, (Fortress Press, 1970)?
12. Campbell
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turning to the still center13. Practically the openness to others means that
one needs to listen to others and take them as they are rejecting general-
ization. This difficulty is particularly dangerous in Project Ruth engage-
ment with a community, which is stereotyped, to an extent that it is easy
to not see how existing generalizations may influence strategy and deci-
sion making. The difficulty in resisting this cannot come easily from ma-
nagement theories or even cross cultural studies but it may come from a
willingness to be open and listen carefully aware that God’s presence is
also in those who are helped as well as in those who help.
The third tension is between dependence and independence.
Charitable efforts even with the best of motivations can be susceptible to
generate dependencies. Fiddes, following Wesley Carr suggests that we
need to distinguish between relationship, which is about relationships
and mutuality, and relatedness which is how people relate to each other
through their roles or through the personage. He argues that we need to
keep both together as relationships although can bring people together
faster create dependency while relatedness develops mutual responsibil-
ity. Our experience at Project Ruth is that dependence is one of the
biggest challenges especially when working with a very poor communi-
ty. The capacity of relationship tends to be exploited for personal benefit,
13. Fiddes, 24.
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which in turn develops dependency. What do you decide when someone
begs? On what basis do you make that decision?
The last tension is between unity and diversity. This points out to
human reaction when encountering someone who is quite different than
us. Whether it is fear of the unknown, or just being uncomfortable with
the different the reaction generally is that we insist on some normative
standard, which we then call normality. This denial of diversity happens
not only outside church but in the church as well sometimes. This can
lead to ignoring the differences that exist and pretending that the others
are like us. In our particular situation our congregation has a small num-
ber of Roma families that a;end the church. However, we also have a
Roma mission church that meets across the street and they refuse to
meet exclusively with us. The question is why do we accept so easily
those who are in our church? Because they accepted to behave like us
and therefore we are content to pretend that they are like us.
ConclusionThirty-four years after the launch of the album The Wall in UK,
Roger Walters produced in 2013 in Bucharest the show The Wall Live. I
could not miss such an event connected with my youth and went to see
it. At the end the cry was tear down that wall and the show ended with
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the demolition of the wall and the tearing apart of the pig puppet float-
ing above the crowd. Although it was a nice trip down memory lane I
wondered what my son’s generation saw as their walls today. And I
could not help feel that after all it was just a staged show. As it happens
in life, the wall will be rebuilt for the next representation and then torn
apart at the end of it. I knew that the church must do be;er than that if it
wants to give meaning to the words of Scripture which although ad-
dressed to a specific audience seem to have more enduring power to
change: 14 For he is our peace, who has made us both one, and has broken
down the dividing wall of hostility, 15 by abolishing in his flesh the law of com-
mandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in
place of the two, so making peace, 16 and might reconcile us both to God in one
body through the cross, thereby bringing the hostility to an end.
Twenty-two years after the start of Project Ruth looking at what
was achieved seems miraculous for those involved. Ongoing reflection,
assessment and involvement with the work of Project Ruth has the po-
tential to make its impact more significant in addressing the walls that
exist in Ferentari and by doing so continuing to be a witness to the pres-
ence of Christ through whom believers can become a dwelling place of God
in the Spirit.
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