Newsletter from Ukraine

Excerto da Newsletter publicada no mês de Junho após a visita do Reitor do Seminário Luterano de Santa Sofia (Ucrânia), Rev. John Vogt a Portugal.

Portugal

The nearest airport to where we live in Ukraine is in the city of Lviv, 2½ hours away.  However, at present many flights into that airport have been cancelled because of extensive renovations in preparation for the European soccer championship to be held in Poland and Ukraine in 2012.  As a result, we had to do some maneuvering to get back to Ternopil.  We ended up flying from Minneapolis to Spain, taking a different airline for a short flight to Italy, and then taking a Romanian airline to Lviv. 

This complication gave us a nice excuse to visit our old friend Pastor Artur Villares and his congregation in Portugal.  I was even given the opportunity to preach on the 12^th.   The Lord has given this small group some significant blessings.  After several years of dialogue a second pastor has joined the church and taken responsibility for the Lisbon congregation.  The city officials in Porto have given Pastor Villares’ congregation the use of a historic chapel in the middle of a popular downtown park.  The chapel has been closed to the public for years, so, when the front door is open, people are drawn by curiosity to it.  When services are held on Sunday afternoons, people wander in, often sitting down to listen to the service for a while.  We discussed what an excellent Christian Information Center this would be and gave encouragement that the congregation open it up on Saturdays or for longer periods on Sunday.

There’s an example of the Lord’s sense of irony and humor.  The altar in this chapel has a life-size statue of the bishop who led the Counter-Reformation in Portugal.  Now every Sunday he has to stand there quietly and listen to a Lutheran service and sermon.

John F. Vogt
June 2011

Counter-Reformation leader listens quietly to a Lutheran sermon in a Lutheran service