SR. ADINA BĂLAN, CJ, IS THE REGIONAL REPRESENTATIVE OF TALITHA KUM FOR EUROPE

Sr. Adina Bălan, CJ, from Romania, is a member of the Congregation of Jesus. She studied criminal and civil law in 2006 and obtained a master’s degree in Communication; she is currently a PhD student at the University of Bucharest.

For the first time in 2007, she met a victim of human trafficking during a conference in Germany. Following this meeting, she wrote her thesis on child trafficking and the desire to do something concrete to help people experiencing these situations was born in her. In 2009, she founded SOLWODI Romania (Solidarity with Women in Difficulty), an NGO specialized in working with women and children victims of human trafficking and domestic violence.

Between 2012 and 2019 she was a member of the Core Group of RENATE (Religious in Europe Networking against Trafficking and Exploitation) and until 2020 she was involved in training on leadership, women empowerment, advocacy, networking and writing child protection texts, policy statements and guidelines, and accompanying victims – probably the mission closest to her heart.

She is currently working in Rome, where she has been assigned, starting from 2020, to a ministry as a JPIC (Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation) coordinator at the congregational level, a joint mission in collaboration with the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary. She is also a member of the advisory board for the IBVM-CJ ONU Desk in New York and a member of the Pax Christi International Board.