Spring meeting of the Social Therapy Working Group in Bulgaria
The Section’s Social Therapy Working Group met in Bulgaria from May 21-25, 2025. The invitation was extended by Irina Paparo and her colleagues from the Sofera community.
The trip was accompanied by many visits to beautiful places in the surrounding area, such as the Rila Monastery, the towns of Mělník, Sadanski and the “Hot Springs”. It was also impressive to get to know the local “Art Center” of Prof. Ivan Russev, an important sculptor who is a project partner of Sofera.
The focus was on getting to know the Sofera community, which has been creating a place of social farming south of Sofia in Illindentsi since 2015.
The related focus was on questions from Bulgaria: How can meaningful services for people with special needs be established and how can the resulting communities work together in a lively way?
There was also a ’round table’ with invited guests from social initiatives in Sofia and time for discussions with the six Sofera employees.Dazu gab es einerseits einen ‹Runden Tisch› mit geladenen Gästen von sozialen Initiativen in Sofia und auch Gesprächszeit mit den sechs Mitarbeitenden von Sofera.
The final event on the last evening was a lecture by Christine Gruwez (BE) “Evil and Good” with eurythmy by the independent ensemble from Sofia at the Sofia Waldorf School. People from the anthroposophical movement in Bulgaria were invited.
The current members of STAG are
Freia Adam (DE), Paulamaria Blaxland-de Lange (UK), Sara Colonna (IT), Zsuzsa Filipov-Soó (RO), Evert Hoefman (NL), Andrea Krohn-Petrovic (DE), Achim Leibing (AT), Irina Paparo (BG), Udo Pfeil (CH), Sebastian Schöning (DE), Martin Schwarz (DE), Sara Siegers (SE), Sonja Zausch (Section Management Team), Guest: Juliane Gravenhorst
Some members will say goodbye in October 2025 in Wuppertal (DE), at the invitation of Andrea Krohn-Petrovic and Porta e.V., and the working group is open to new interested people who work in social therapy and are interested in an anthroposophically based and open exchange with colleagues. The group sees itself as an open discussion and working body that can contribute to and receive the ‘vessel of social therapy’ and make the content developed available to the worldwide network.
Contact sonja.zausch@goetheanum.ch
See also: Report on Sonja Zausch’s visit in October 2022
Fotos: privat source
