Bethlen Almanac 1999 (Ligonier)

The Bethlen Home

there next day. The presbyters, using laptop computers, had their reports immediately printed and available, while the ministers still read their hand-written reports. Among these young leaders let me mention Les Martin of Trenton. He used to be a chief-engineer for the Highway Department in New Jersey. Two years ago he took early retirement, and enrolled at Princeton Theological Seminary as a full-time student, while preaching at several nearby smaller Hungarian congregations.

Among the Presbyters’ recommendations I am lifting up only two now. They recommend a more active role for our youth by asking them to be greeters together with the elders, at the beginning of each worship service. Perhaps, this will motivate us, as presently we experience difficulties even to find adult greeters. The other recommendation also involves youth: visiting our members by a team consisting of the pastor, an elder and a youth member. The Presbyters’ Associaton is aware that visitation is every elder’s responsibility.

As the Presbyters’ meeting is always on the Labor Day weekend, we had no representation there in the past few years. Every church member is welcome there; one does not need to be an elder to attend. We hope that in the future there will be one or more families from our church who will be glad to spend that weekend in the picturesque scenery of Ligonier, and among members of our sister churches. The famous kitchen and bacon fry of the Bethlen Home are also inducing factors.

Monday morning we had a joint worship service with communion to close the Presbyters’ meeting and commence the American Hungarian Ministerial Association’s Annual Meeting. The Rt. Rev. László Horkay, Bishop of the Reformed Church of Carpatho-Ukraine, preached at the service. Then, the Bethlen Home hosted a dinner for all of us. The keynote speaker was Bishop Horkay, who in a humble manner, but with the power of the Holy Spirit testified about his own faith, and of the trials and the moral courage of the Hungarians in Carpatho-Ukraine. They received substantial help from the sister churches in Holland, and Germany, and also from the American churches. The new Hungarian schools are of utmost importance. The Bishop himself, learned his English by attending some of the classes there. He could conduct brief sermons and give verbal reports in English. For decades, there was no official theological education in Carpatho-Ukraine. The older pastors conducted clandestine classes for the young candidates. The Bishop humbly acknowledged that the source of his own education was mainly

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