UUA and UUPCC Presidents Call for Help
Flash Flooding Devastates Unitarian Villages in Transylvania

UU Transylvania Flood Relief Update: As of October 27, 2005, the relief fund has received $152,030. Thank you for your generosity!

Flood damage in Transylvania

Dear Friends:

Tuesday night August 23, the area of the Nyiko Valley of Transylvania was hit with an 8-foot wall of water in a flash flood that swept through the Unitarian villages of Simenfalva, Kobatfalva and Kadacs (located today in Romania ). Rev. Lajos Lorinczi reports that every household in Simenfalva, a village of 1000, was impacted. Two women died in Simenfalva and three more in Kadacs as the waters rushed through taking livestock, crops, food and wood stockpiles, utensils, furniture, and in some cases entire houses and barns.

UU John Dale who was there when it happened emailed us that, "There were torrential rains Tuesday night which sent walls of water down many of the minor streams in and around Szekelyudvarhely..." The estimate of the damage in Szekelyudvarhely alone is in the many millions of dollars.

The Rev. Lajos Lorinczi and the Rev.Jozsef Sombatfalvi are helping to lead relief and clean-up crews with Unitarians from as far away as Kolozsvar and Sepsiszentgyorgy coming to help. However, the Unitarian village families hardest hit will need our help over the long haul. "We have the immediate relief that we need," said Rev. Lorinczi. "But we don't know how we will help the people rebuild their homes and their lives."

The UUA and the UU Partner Church Council are asking for your help because no one else is going to help our Transylvanian Unitarian community to start their lives anew, to create new hope in a time of despair. The Unitarians are an ethnic minority in their own land. The government will not help them to rebuild their lives. They need us now, and we can do this.

The UUA and UUPCC are committed to helping these Unitarians rebuild their lives, their houses, their barns and their herds of goats and cows. They need to replace all of these plus feed for stock, seed for new crops, and firewood and food to get through the winter.

Transylvanian minister Miklos Szekely wrote in a prayer, "Whatever I have to face, be it joy or sorrow, give me strength to carry through the new day." With our partnership in the rebuilding, our brothers and sisters in faith may find new joy to heal their sorrow.

Unitarian Universalists are a generous people because we care. And many of us have known the generosity that Transylvanian Unitarians have given us. We know you will do what you can. Please send a check today.

Faithfully yours,
Rev. William G. Sinkford President, Unitarian Universalist Association	Mrs. Barbara Kres Beach, President, UU Partner Church Council

• Prayer In a Time of Flash Floods, by Rev. Olivia Holmes
• How to Make a Donation to the UU Transylvania Flood Relief
• Flood News updates from Transylvania

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