heks

Outreach work and community development are the two main focuses of the interchurch aid in Eastern Europe. The churches still have a lot of catching up to more than twenty years after the political sea-change in Eastern Europe. They are expected to overcome major challenges in a society with a rapidly changing mentality and economic structure. In attempting to build a fair society the local parishes need support from partners from other countries. In terms of community development HEKS has committed itself to the renovation of church buildings and training centres. It provides solidarity in pastoral care and outreach work. Its central burden is to nurture or restore the human dignity of people excluded from society and segregated by poverty, disease and disability.

Aims, points of focus, initiatives:

HEKS has undertaken to give financial aid for the renovation of the oldest holiday retreat in the Czech Republic. The centre in Belec is a place where families and children can holiday in the countryside close to nature. It was built in 1929 by the Evangelical Church of the Bohemian Brethren.

HEKS also supports a home for the disabled with workshops in Vrchlabí in the upper Elbe valley. On the recommendation of HEKS, a planning office was set up in the 1990s within the central administrative framework of the Evangelical Church of the Bohemian Brethren in Prague to conduct technical and financial feasibility checks in respect of all the major building and renovation projects submitted by the church as a whole. One such project was the refurbishment of a church community centre in the south of Prague. Another one was the family camp in Chotebor, an hour’s drive from Prague and particularly popular with large families and classes from city schools.
Technical improvements were made to the heating system in the Herlikovice mountain hut, achieving a considerable reduction in energy consumption. The Evangelical Church of the Bohemian Brethren runs international youth camps here, making an indirect contribution to Czech-German reconciliation.