Jane’s faith and silence - growing a charity into a family

Driven by faith, a British woman who likes painting and who lives by the sea, helps Romanian children without family support. With some support from Prince Charles and aided by the charity shops opened in Western London, she offers Romanian children a second chance. Three girls with braided hair, two little boys, and a few adult women stand up and whisper a short prayer before lunch. Then everybody goes louder and normal conversation sets in while everybody starts eating: vegetable soup first, followed by fish with rice and biscuit cake at the end. Jane, the British woman who built the house and has tried in the last 20 years to make this children center feel like home, particularly likes the vegetable soup. “It is carrot?” she asks. “It’s delicious.” The house where we all eat is called St. Gabriel and it’s the second children center Jane Nicholson founded in Romania in 1998. The first one, the St. Nicolas center, is in Suceava, in northeast Romania and was founded one year earlier. These two places match Jane’s initial idea that abandoned kids shouldn’t grow up in institutions, but in places which resemble families; places where they receive more than a bed and some food. But after a while she realized that some kids are too traumatized and they need more than a family; they need therapy, special care, and permanent supervision. That’s how St.Raphael was born, a center for young people with disabilities. It is also located in Popesti Leordeni, near Bucharest, like the St.Gabriel house, the place where we just finished our biscuit cakes. Two of the girls come near Jane and offer her a Martisor (trinket), as March 1 is approaching. They smile a bit shyly, but when it comes to hugging, they don’t show any reserve and cover her in their embrace. Their small bodies carry such a big love.