A Busy Sunday in Zapresic

Sunday was a full day. In the morning, I spoke to the congregation presenting a lesson both encouraging them to grow and to come out to the evening lessons. In the evening, the program was again mostly to the congregation, though there were some guests for the science program.

At noon, they had a birthday party for Nicola (Ivan's brother) and Tomi, one of the young people. They tell me this is usually held the last Sunday of the month, but my visit gave them excuse to have it this Sunday and next Sunday too!

Zapresic is a little community nestled among the mountains of Zagreb region in Croatia. Ivan and I had opportunity to drive around a little Saturday. The view to the front of the Christian Family Center in Zapresic shows the mountain, complete with some of the rock cuts. The mornings bring a cool breeze off the hill, but the afternoons can be very humid, with the Adriatic Sea influencing the weather patterns here.

The country was previously ruled by a royal family. During some of the turmoil of past political change, some of the Dukes of Croatia left the country, ceding some of their property to the Catholic Church. One of these castles, pictured here, has become an orphanage, and the church in Zapresic helps with this home when money is available. As a result, a young girl who lost her mother recently (the father is alcoholic and there were some allegations of abuse) was able to go to this home, and is allowed occasionally to attend meetings of the church, although the home is run by the Catholic Church.

Driving through a country that was very recently ravaged by war, and seeing the poppies growing wild in the field, it is not hard to picture what the poet was seeing as he penned the words to the poem about Flander's Field. I have been told that we will visit some of the areas that were hit harder by the fighting on Wednesday or Thursday. Sentiments are still strong in the area, one of the members of the congregation here was involved in the fighting and he returned with an illness he will suffer the rest of his life, but life has returned to somewhat normal. We were down near the border with Slovenia on Saturday, and Ivan commented that we could drive into that country by just continuing down the road.

Tomorrow we go into Zagreb to visit with the faculty and students at the Bible Institute there.