Magyar Egyház, 1957 (36. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1957-04-01 / 4. szám
MAGYAR EGYHÁZ 13 PROTEST "MARTIN LUTHER" FILM CANCELLATION National Council of Church officials joined with Protestant church leaders in the Chicago area and with others in protest at the cancellation by a Chicago television station of its plan to present the motion picture “Martin Luther” on the air waves. The video showing was cancelled because of pressure brought by the Roman Catholic Church, an action committee named by Chicago Protestant leaders charged. Such de facto censorship, their formal statement charged, “violates the principles of civil and religious liberty as defined in the First Amendment of the Constitution.” The station, WGN-TV, operated by the Chicago Tribune, announced, however, that withdrawal of the program was due to “an emotional reaction to the plan” to present the film. Protestant leaders answered that this constituted an admission by the station that “it is vulnerable to pressures which we are convinced, on the basis of our discussion with WGN, have been mobilized by the Roman Catholic Church to secure banning of the film.” It was also an admission, the action committee declared, that “only such news, information, education and entertainment as are satisfactory to a particular denomination may be presented to the public by WGN.”---------o--------Bishop Bereczky’s Resignation Questioned The Council of the General Synod of the Hungarian Reformed Church is investigating the resignation of Bishop Albert Bereczky of the Danubian district who relinquished his office during the extensive changes in Protestant church leadership during November. The circumstances surrounding the resignation are to be re-examined. E.P.S., Geneva ians, and there was a language barrier between the officials and the escapees, not helped at all by second rate interpreters. It is evident that the Hungarian Protestant population deserves more representation in the great world agencies. Czech Protestantism is but a fraction of the Hungarian in size and quality, but is far better represented. This is due in large measure to the traditional approach of the Western churchmen who let traitors like Dr. Joseph Hromadka become their favorite sons, largely because of the influence of Dr. Karl Barth who still hasn’t realized that the Communists mean business as they seek to annihilate Christianity in Eastern Europe. All in all, the chaplaincy to Hungarian escapees was a wonderful experience. It reminded me once again that the Hungarian people have a will to live in liberty, and that it is about time that the Western World came to know more of this small nation which believes fervently enough to risk extinction. HOSPITALITY UNLIMITED France Receives Hungarian Refugees by John Garrett November 9, 1956, began it. Thirty-eight of the first arrivals came that day from Austria by plane, forty by bus. Catholic Welfare took 38. CIMADE, the Protestant relief agency working for refugees since the blackest days of World War II, took 40. Ever since, with a short break at Christmas, they have been arriving. France, like Britain, agreed to open her doors to all who left Hungary after the tragic uprising of last October. On that first cold afternoon when they began to come, the venerable Pastor Marc Boegner, CIMADE’s president and one of the original presidents of the World Council of Churches, the “grand old man of French Protestantism”, cancelled an important engagement to be there in Paris to greet them. He stood waiting in the biting weather for three hours, with knots of pressmen and a thousand of his fellow-countrymen who were curious to see so many heroes. “France, you see, is a very sentimental country underneath everything”, explained Jacques Beaumont, the executive secretary of CIMADE. The reception centres for the first group were ready. They went to homes already established by CIMADE to meet previous needs, Sucy-en-Brie and Sevres, both near Paris. Robert Muller, young colleague of Beaumont in CIMADE, was soon in touch with John Metzler, who administers the Church World Service programme for distribution of US contributed goods from Geneva. Together they agreed to release stocks of food and clothing. They were sent to Austria for the relief of Hungary. A team of four organizations was gradually rallied to make the promise of unlimited refuge in France a local reality. Loyal to the World Council of Churches, CIMADE simultaneously welcomed, housed, fed, clothed, advised the refugees and placed them in jobs. While this was going on an appeal was launched in the Reformed, Lutheran and Orthodox Churches throughout the land. The results have been the greatest ever — 30,000 dollars in two months. Among those working with the staff in Paris was Emeric Kulifay, chaplain to the Hungarian refugees already resident in the French capital. Interpreters were drawn from his contacts. Students and skilled workers, professional groups, single women, all had to be related in some way to employers who would take them compassionately and fit them into the pattern of daily life in the new country. To make it possible the men and women of CIMADE had to stand outside many doors and undermine walls of traditional resistance. Kulifay, the Paris pastor, became a self-styled “walking telephone book”. After the first week the newcomers flocked in at an alarming rate to other parts of the country, where the government received them for the time being in military camps. A map behind Beaumont’s desk grew colourful day by day as he stuck flags into it to show where they were, and persisted in his urgent phone calls to pastors in odd comers of his country. The magic worked. People opened their homes and cleared dormitories in existing institutions. They did research into job openings and became channels for the distribution of prayer books and Bibles.
