Former atheist shapes God-centered program in Moldova

Posted: 12/14/07

Former atheist shapes
God-centered program in Moldova

By Craig Bird

Baptist Child & Family Services

SAN ANTONIO—Five weeks in North Carolina undid a lifetime of atheistic indoctrination for Tatiana Ceban. Nearly 14 years later, she is helping Baptist Child & Family Services craft a transitional living program for youth who have aged out of government-run orphanages in Moldova.

“The most important goal is to teach everything through God’s perspective,” she said.

Such a concept was practically unthinkable for her before 1994. Three years after Moldova gained its independence following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Little Samaritan Mission invited Ceban and 11 other teachers to its Smokey Mountain headquarters, paired them with American public school teachers and exposed them to Christian witness.

As the only one of the group to become a Christian, she became the first member of her family to profess faith in Christ. Her mother, sister and both of her children have become Christians in recent years.

That was just the first of many life changes that took her out of the public school system after 20 years, into her own successful youth mentoring program, through the unexpected severing of her working relationship with the government schools, and into a role with Children’s Emergency Relief International, the overseas arm of Baptist Child & Family Services.

“When we geared up to take the next step to deeper involvement in Moldova, the first name our CERI-Moldova staff suggested to head up the effort was Tatiana,” Baptist Child & Family Services President Kevin Dinnin said.

“Over the years, we have built good working relationships with orphanage directors and government officials. But the introduction of a program to provide life skills to 16-year-old suddenly on their own in a safe environment needed someone with a special set of skills as an educator, a passionate advocate for children, an administrator, a motivator and a person of deep faith. We were blessed when Tatiana agreed to join us in this important effort.”

Ceban spent six weeks training with Baptist Child & Family Services—learning in a classroom, sitting in support groups of youth who have aged out of the Texas foster care system, shadowing case workers, studying mentor programs and even participating in a “lock-in” at the agency’s Kerrville Transition Center.

“I have to develop the entire curriculum from scratch for the CERI program in Moldova, so I was looking for things I could use and things that wouldn’t work because of the cultural differences between Texas and Moldova,” she said.

“There are some major differences. We have to teach about the dangers of human trafficking, and money management instruction will be different because our financial system is different. Drug abuse is not a major problem—alcohol is.”

But, like in Texas, “the most important need of kids is life skills,” she said. “They get a general education, but when they graduate from orphanage at age 16, they are pretty much helpless—no money, no family support, for many no place to stay, living on streets, vulnerable to human trafficking and crime.”

She plans to begin with a mentoring program, concentrating on graduates from the orphanages CERI already is working with, to “give them tools for life and support them.” She will look for Baptist churches to host Circles of Concern support groups, as well as serve as recruiting grounds “for young Christians who want to be involved in helping these kids,” she said. “I can train them as mentors”

On the national stage, she hopes to develop relationships with Moldovan universities and collaborate with them to train social workers.

“Perhaps in time, the universities will be asking us to offer internships for their students,” she added.

She has earned the right to be heard on the subject. Five years after becoming a Christian, Ceban resigned her job as a high school principal and established the Aletheia (Greek for “truth”) Foundation.

The mentoring program was based in public schools and targeted student in grades seven through nine—“not orphans but from poorest districts of city and dysfunctional homes,” she explained.

They met daily in groups of 12 to 15 with mentors.

“We provided food, medicine, school supplies, camps, retreats and Bible study,” she said. “Our end goal was to introduce them to church and lead them to Christianity. Our immediate educational aim was to graduate them from middle school—let them know they could go to college and provide scholarships.”

After the first year, students were paired with an elderly person. “They visited them two times a month, took them food and medicine provided by Aletheia, cleaned their houses and witnessed to them,” she explained. “The educational moment was to show them that there were people even worse off.”

Last year, the program connected 70 young people with 85 senior adults.

In September, she was notified that, while the government considered the program valuable, it no longer could be based in the public schools.

She already had declined CERI’s overtures to head up the program because “I had my own thing and was happy with it.” But when the government excluded her from the schools she realized it was “God’s design” and now, her “biggest hope” is to be able to blend that program into CERI’s transitional living program.

“We can educate the community, set up a website for orphans. Kids age out at 16, but aren’t legally adults until 18. For those two years, no one takes care of them. They are helpless. They don’t know their rights or how to get benefits—who they can ask for help. This would help all the children of Moldova. There’s nothing like that now.”

On her last day of training in San Antonio, she looked at a photo of the dedication of the BCFS Kerrville Transition Center last February.

“I dream of that day for us, a big modern building—a home for the kids to come to, centrally located so they can get to it,” she said. “That means in central Chisinau, even though real estate is very expensive. We can build something that is uniquely theirs—someplace they can come without difficulty. … Maybe at first we’ll use church facilities, but we need our own place so they will know and feel it is their place. They feel lost, in need of support—especially from Christians.

“The presence of CERI will be unbelievable. My dream is to help all the kids of Moldova. This is the small first step, but God wants us to dream big.”