Gyulai Éva - Viga Gyula (szerk.): Történet - muzeológia : Tanulmányok a múzeumi tudományok köréből a 60 éves Veres László tiszteletére (Miskolc, 2010)

EGYHÁZ- ÉS FELEKEZETTÖRTÉNET - Fazekas Csaba: Észak-magyarországi vármegyék egyházpolitikai feliratai V. Ferdinándhoz 1840 novemberéből

LEVÉLTÁRI FORRÁSOK B.-A.-Z. m. Lt. IV. 501/e. Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén megyei Levéltár, Borsod vármegye levéltára. Közgyűlési iratok. EPL Kop. Cat. 39. Esztergomi Prímási Levéltár. Kopácsy József. Matrimonia mixta. Petitions on Church Policy to King Ferdinand V from North-Hungarian Counties, November 1840 The paper publishes two petitions focusing on Church Political questions from Abaúj and Gömör Counties. At the end of the 1830's and the beginning of the 1840's there was a big debate in Hungarian political life on the question of mixed (Catholic-Protestant) marriages. In spring of 1839 Ferenc Lajcsák, the bishop of Nagyvárad published a circular letter among the priests of his bishopric, in which they prohibited for their priests to confirm those mixed marriages where the Protestant husband did not give a so-called reservation (reversalis). This reservation meant that the children to be bom from the marriage would be baptised Catholic. Lajcsák's circular made the bigger reaction. In such cases of mixed marriages the bishop just permitted for the priests to acknowledge the marriage without ecclesiastical blessing and not in the territory of the temple but out in the churchyard without the compulsory ceremonial garment. (This type of celebration was the so-called passiva assistentia.) The regulation caused protest throughout the counties and these grievances concerning religious issues largely contributed to the flames of opponitionism in the lower nobility. In the end of the 1839-1840 diet was reached an agreement between the upper and the lower houses of the diet accepting a basically liberal law on the matter. But King Ferdinand V postponed to confirm it. After the closing of the diet the bishopric circle decided a definitive resistance: a common bishopric circular extended the regulation by Lajcsák's diocese over the Catholic church of Hungary. The indignation of the county nobility was bigger than the bishops expected. For the first time county of Pest (the 'leading county' of Hungarian Liberals) declared the ecclesiastical procedure of passiva assistentia unlawful, furthermore catholic priests demanding reservations were held out the prospect of legal procedure and conviction. In the end of 1840 and the first months of 1841 most counties agreed the viewpoint of Pest. The overwhelming majority of the county nobility deemed the behaviour of the clergy as harmful and rose in clamorous protest against it. Abaúj and Gömör (under an impact of the neighbour county of Borsod) were among the first counties, which wrote petition to the king to stop the unlawful actions of the Catholic Church. The petitions were written in a pathetic style and included a very similar theoretical structure. They founded their viewpoints on the bishops' one-sided and dangerous interpretation of the 1791 Act on religious legislation, pointed that it is not a theological, but political questions, because makes conflicts between the churches. The petitions summarized the liberal political efforts for freedom of religion, the separate the Catholic Church and the state and destroy the privileges of the bishops. Csaba Fazekas 456