Founding a church appears to be a simple action through which one man or a group of people decide to build a new place of prayer. But what does this mean, beyond the walls of such a place? Founding a church means choosing a piece of this beautiful earth (made once ‘extremely good’ by our God, but which man, due to the fall, defiled with much uncleanness and many sins), making it clean, adorning it as best as man can, blessing it and offering it back to God, as a meeting place with Him, with His brethren - that is your brethren, with the whole Church. A divine palace built up between the ruins of world on which the sun is setting. Heaven on earth.

Here we are, after six and a half years of service in the church of the Monastery ‘The Protection of the Mother of God’ in Vedrin, at whose foundation God appointed us to take part of. Now, the parish ‘All Saints’ is called to build a new meeting place, a new work to announce of the Kingdom of God, in Huldenberg, near the city of Leuven. If the Lord helps us and if we finish all the necessary works, with the blessing of our Metropolitan, Sunday October the 8th we will serve the first Divine Liturgy in our new church, at:

Sint-Jansbergsteenweg 44A 
3040 HULDENBERG (Loonbeek)

We start the journey again to this “new earth and new Heaven” with hope and trust in God’s love, where our lives and the lives of our children have the chance to be renewed, to become more beautiful, to become richer, and to become closer to God’s thought for each one of us.

The story, briefly

The search for a church for our parish was resumed in 2015. In December 2016 we found a large building in a village nearby the city of Leuven, where we would be able to continue our prayers, as well as all the aspects of our parish life and of the Orthodox mission in the West. With the support of many of the brethren and intimate friends of our parish, we paid an advance, including all the notary fees related to the purchase and afterwards we also obtained a purchase credit (worth over 200.000€) to be repaid in ten years. In June of this year, several days before the feast day of our parish – The Sunday of All Saints – we signed the contract to purchase the building and we received the keys. Then, after several months of prayerful waiting, we received the final blessing for the new Home of our Parish from the Holy Mother of God Herself, a day before the Feast of her Birth. In other words, we received the urbanism permit, (that is, the earthly denomination for this birth miracle: the administration’s acceptance of the transformation of the purchased building into a church).

Preparations

Since then, enthusiasm has filled our hearts more and and we have been working from dawn to night to advance with renovating, arranging and making this new place more beautiful. This project is, however, quite large and it requires serious investment, the most important being that related to heating as well as the roof installation. The roof must be completely changed due to its deplorable condition. The estimated costs are high (for example, just for the roof, we need approximately 40.000 €). But together we can be many and thus the burden is shared. Therefore, I dare to ask for your support: if your eyes are now reading these lines, it means that God’s providence has so ordained: to call upon you, if you wish, to be a founder through any form of engagement, starting with a prayer. Is this a small thing?

You can send us your gift to the parish account:

Account (IBAN): BE03 3631 2661 8584 
BIC/SWIFT: BBRUBEBB 
Beneficiary: ASBL PORTS

The journey continues with the Lord’s help and with yours!

Deeply grateful,

In the name of ‘All Saints’ Parish

Father Ciprian Grădinaru