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Do for others what you want them to do for you: this is the meaning of the Law and the prophets.
Our dear friends and supporters offered us the means to rent a house in Tallinn where we could open a Children’s Home, but no one was willing to rent us a house. In the autumn of 1998, the pastor of the congregation, together with the church board and children’s supporters, made the decision that the only way to help the children was to offer them accommodation at Peeteli. This was now possible because building toilets and shower rooms had recently finished in the Day Center rooms, giving the children the opportunity to wash themselves.
At the end of 1998, we offered children the possibility that anyone who was willing to go to school every day, stop smoking, stop sniffing glue and stop using alcohol and drugs could come and live in the church. Fighting and swearing were not allowed. After school, they had to come home to study, and they had to be home by eight o’clock in the evening. For children who had lived according to their own rules on the streets for years, this was a difficult choice. In January 1999, two girls came and said they were willing. Since then, the Peeteli kiriku sotsiaalkeskus has been providing support to children 24/7.
The number of children who wanted to come and live in the church kept increasing, and by autumn, the rooms became too small. The only place where living quarters could be added was the church’s balcony, where the organ had once stood and which had been closed off during the Soviet era. In October 1999, two new bedrooms, a toilet, and shower rooms were completed there, and by the end of the year, 12 children were living in Peeteli.
