The exclusion the Roma have experienced is truly without equal. So is the nature of the redemption and transformation of the Gospel.
Author: Jim Baker
Marginal Mission Network leader with ReachGlobal Europe, passionate about serving at the margins. We are now living in the woods in VA working on restoring an old grist mill and farmhouse to host a community that will provide, rest, restoration, reflection, training, connections... and lots of good music!
Don’t look back…
Peter Kuzmic, speaking in Budapest this fall at the “Roma to the Nations” consultation, commented, regarding the history of Europe and the Roma people, that “Europe was never truly evangelized… it was Christianized.” I think that’s an interesting and illuminating comment to set beside the prevailing narrative of “post-Christian Europe,” currently popular among mission workers…
Learning to build on the strength of the weak
Eszter Dani is a pastor in the Hungarian Reformed Church. We met in Budapest at the Roma to the Nations consultation in October. She is bright, affable, articulate and energetic. In the course of conversation, we found that we had a few things in common: a passion for the Roma people, a long stretch of cross-cultural…
Life with the Roma – on a hard, dusty road
We are in Europe. The EU. One of the more progressive and prosperous societies in human history. Just 3 miles outside a quite nice, small city in central Romania. We are in a Roma community of about 400 people living in ramshackle dwellings on a dusty road leading up to the hills off the main…
Learning from the Gypsies – Part 1 of a series
I’ve had enough time for my thoughts to start to settle and begin to distill some of the many impressions gained from spending most of October immersed in the culture of the European Roma. Our Catalyst Team started off by pulling into Budapest just a couple hours before the beginning of the “Roma to the…
We live in a fallen world… So what of it?
We were talking a while ago about prayer… not the “now-I-lay-me-down-to-sleep” sort of pious niceties, nor the generic “sending-good-vibes-your-way” sort of thing we often encounter. But prayer considered as a weapon. That’s something that can’t be done without an attitude of repentance… it certainly can’t be done if one is self-righteous or self-serving. But there’s…
October update – Roma Reflections
Once we get a little wood split, we’ll be spending some time on the Porch thinking through our amazing travel through the Gypsy villages of Romania and how deeply it’s impacted us. For now, we thought we’d share the “ministry update” that we periodically issue in conjunction with our work with ReachGlobal. October Baker Update…
“We don’t need you!” Reflections from a traveler at the margins.
Psalm 41:5-9 My enemies say of me in malice, “When will he die and his name perish?” Whenever one comes to see me, he speaks falsely, while his heart gathers slander; then he goes out and spreads it abroad. All my enemies whisper together against me; they imagine the worst for me, saying, “A vile…
Mill Pond Porch 