Magyar Egyház, 1970 (49. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1970-05-01 / 5. szám
10 MAGYAR EGYHÁZ body that will have time to listen a few minutes and who really and truly will treat them as they would a grown-up who might be useful to them. You know—polite to them. If you folks had ever said to me: ‘Pardon me’ when you interuppted me, Pd have dropped dead. If anybody asks you where I am, tell them I’ve gone looking for somebody with time because I’ve got a lot of things I want to talk about. Love to all, “Joe” As we think of this enormously important need for us to listen to our children do not our consciences accuse us? Do they not also accuse us, as Christian parents, when we ponder the great need to pray for our children? For a good parent is not only a mediator and a listener, but also an intercessor: one who has a vocation for prayer. My mother not only prayed for me, but I can remember the times when she prayed with me. Prayer will change our attitude toward them and make us more sensitive to their needs, more open to their friendship, more encouraging to their confidence. What kind of prayers, spoken or unspoken, do we offer God on behalf of our children? Is our only enthusiasm that they be well clothed, well-fed, welleducated? That they find a good-paying job, a respectable place in society, a nice person to marry? But what about their souls? What about their relationship with their Creator and Christ their Redeemer to whom they owe all their powers and their very existance, and before whom, with us, they are responsible? If they are permitted to fall out of His hand, into what other hands do you think they will fall! 0, mother, when I think of thee, ’Tis but a step to Calvary, Thy gentle hand upon my brow Is leading me to Jesus now. LET US PRAY . . . Our Father, bless thou the homes of thy people. Give them true ideals of helpfulness. Let all that dwell therein have a real sense of the responsibility that rests on each that the earthly home may reflect the blessedness of the eternal home. May our home be such that the Spirit of Christ may find a true welcome and that he may constantly be our guest. Bless all Mothers. Give them grace for their tasks and may they have the support and appreciation and generous aid of all in the home. We ask in the name of Christ. Amen. B. J. Sathmary Dezső Ábrahám: CONFIRMATION You may read the Bible and never find the word confirmation as a “rite” in it, even though you know that churches have had this custom for centuries. The Lord Jesus Christ gave his disciples the commandment to baptize all people: this was carried out by the early Christians. As households were received into the fellowship of Christendom, the younger children did not know much about their faith and the Lord, therefore, as they grew older and learned the Gospel of Christ, eventually they arrived to the point, when they, too, wished to confess their faith, and become adult members of the church, who can participate in the sacrament of the Holy Communion. During the centuries this custom, along with many others lost its original significance and became just another ceremony. So, it was natural, that there were some oppositions raised against confirmation during the dark Middle Ages. As the Reformation leaders tried to purify the church from human errors and conceptions, they wanted to restore this ancient custom to its original evangelical form. Infant baptism was accepted by the historical reformation forces, Lutherans, Calvinists, or Reformed, as they were called, and Christian instruction of children was entrusted to the church leaders. The catechization of the children with an examination in the truths of the Christian religion became an integral part of congregational life. This rite or custom of confirmatio was introducted by Butzer and others in Germany and Switzerland, and by the leaders of reformation in Hungary, too. Martin Luther, John Calvin and others wrote short catechisms which prepared the children for their confirmation. It was the duty of qualified teachers and ministers to educate the children and to examine them and, if found competent, to admit them to the Table of the Lord. The adoption of public confirmation became the practice of the evangelical churches and enhanced the effect of catechetical instruction which climaxed in the official and ceremonial form of confirmation, when children openly confessed their faith. It is very important that sound instruction about our religion and the true teachings of our faith and the holy Bible should be implanted into the hearts of young children, who are receptive to new ideas and what they learn early remains with them as long as they live. In the history of the Reformed Church of Hungary, gradually a unified and generally accepted solemn ecclesiastical rite was adopted, which is used
