Cold and Hungry, Marginalized Families Need Help. Volunteer Ministers of Budapest Join Other Nonprofits to Provide Winter Jackets and Food

Ten months into the COVID-19 crisis, Volunteer Ministers of the Church of Scientology Budapest continue to raise donations and deliver supplies to those in need.

For Hungarian families already challenged financially before COVID-19, the pandemic has put them further at risk. Many depend on the country’s charities to make it through these trying times. 

Because of the pandemic, food insecurity and hunger have become facts of life for many families in the country.

Raising donations of food and goods and working with other Hungarian charities, the Volunteer Ministers (VMs) from the Church of Scientology Budapest continue to serve those in need. And as winter deepens, with the country under lockdown to fight the third wave of the virus, those needs increase dramatically.

So the VMs continue their work to distribute durable food, fresh fruit and vegetables and hygiene products to at-risk families.

“We believe that we are all stronger when we come together,” says Timea Vojtilla, who heads up the Budapest VMs. She posted on Facebook thanking everyone who donated or helped with these activities.

Scientology Volunteer Ministers also learned that Tündérpakk Foundation—a charity they frequently work with—was collecting jackets for needy neighbors and the homeless. 

“It's cold out there,” posted Vojtilla. “Very cold. This could cost people their lives in the midst of a pandemic. This is why we decided to support the Tündérpakk Foundation’s coat giveaway. Some of the coats we collected, we simply hung up on Tündérpakk’s door for people to come by and take them. The rest, we delivered to the head of the foundation.”

Tündérpakk Foundation is a nonprofit founded and run by two mothers because, they say on their website, “it is part of our lives to help our fellow human beings.”

“Thank you for your selfless support of those in need in Budapest and throughout the country,” posted Vojtilla about Tündérpakk. “We love helping with you!”

The Scientology Volunteer Ministers of Hungary are headquartered at the Church of Scientology Budapest, whose new home was dedicated in 2016 by Mr. David Miscavige, ecclesiastical leader of the Scientology religion. The Church of Scientology Volunteer Ministers program is a religious social service created in the mid-1970s by Scientology Founder L. Ron Hubbard.

A Volunteer Minister’s mandate is to be “a person who helps his fellow man on a volunteer basis by restoring purpose, truth and spiritual values to the lives of others.” Their creed: “A Volunteer Minister does not shut his eyes to the pain, evil and injustice of existence. Rather, he is trained to handle these things and help others achieve relief from them and new personal strength as well.”