On13th and 14th November, in Cluj-Napoca, took place the First Congress of Evangelical Political Leadership. As it is mentioned in its title, this was an absolute premiere for Romania, the first event of this kind. The initiative was planned ahead when a group of Evangelical Parliament Members, met in the Northern part of Romania, to discuss what can be done for a stronger implication of Christians in political arena.

The goal was to bring together people from political arena, businessmen and religious leaders who have a strong interest in politics, no matter of their political affiliation or their denomination. So the first challenge was to identify whom are the Christians involved in political structures, which was quite hard to accomplish but through the active involvement of each political leader in the end almost 240 people participated.

In a very nice avenue, during the two days of the conference there were discussed different issues who could be summon up by three big topics: redefinition, responsibility and reaffirming.

REDEFINITION: where are we as Christians after 500 years from the Protestant Reformation, how the Reformation impacted the society in terms of ethic, moral, work mentality.

It was presented the South-Korean model as an example of applied Reformation and then were discussed sensitive actual issues like the Referendum for the definition of the family in the Romanian Constitution as the union between a husband and a wife. Thisled to the second topic: RESPONSABILITY. What is the role of the Christian people and especially of Christian politicians in our society? Should Christians be involved in Politics? How can be changed the wrong way Christians politicians are perceived in many churches? How can Christians from different parties and denominations can join together in supporting the Christian vision in projects like pro-life, pro-values, freedom of religion and the right of the Christian parents to raise their children according with their beliefs. In this sense Bodnariu’s Case was presented as a model of what can be done when people join their forces together and act properly. Very welcomed were the personal testimonies of three Members of the Parliament who opened their hearts and presented their personal life struggles and the way God called them to be in these high positions of responsibility.

In terms of REAFFIRMING, the participants were encouraged to express their opinion and there were three workshops when the people split in three categories: people from public administration, NGOs and churches, Members of Parliament and Government, and business people. It was a real fellowship and people appreciated this initiative of staying and praying together, sharing each others points of view and making plans for the spiritual benefit of our society. There were collected a lot of ideas for specific future projects. For example, there were made decisions to organize regional and local meetings and to keep in touch, but also to scan furthermore to find other Christians involved in politics because even in the same county people don`t seem to know much of each other. There were also plans for the next big event, the National Prayer Breakfast that will be in the Parliament of Romania on 7-8Th of November 2017. The feedback was beyond expectations. Many of the participants really wanted to express their appreciation and joy for the meeting. The openness of the MPs to pour their hearts and share their testimonies made many people to change their opinion about the Christians involved at this high level. This newly started network seems to be very encouraging for a future better collaboration between politicians from different parties and denominations. God`s blessing was clearly seen and to Him be all the glory!