Magyar Hírek, 1988 (41. évfolyam, 1-22. szám)
1988-04-22 / 8. szám
Hie liiiLi£ kittit feock with Bishop Béla Harmath of the Lutheran Church Hungarian Lutherans at home and abroad? “We are maintaining close contacts with Hungarian congregations everywhere. These are usually united Protestant congregations, Lutherans and Calvinists. They exist in almost all of the Western countries of Europe, but also in North and South America. The shortage of ministers is general, therefore we send some from Hungary from time to time. In Saö Paulo, for instance, retired ministers work in the local Hungarian congregation for two to three years. Foreign students also study at our Theological Academy. They come from the Federal Republic of Germany and Finland, and recently we are receiving increasing numbers of applications for enrolment from America. Those in charge of voluntary services abroad pay frequent visits to Hungary. At the moment there is a couple here from South America, both of whom are ordained. The husband will soon take his doctor’s degree at our Theological Academy. Their daughter is studying in North America, she speaks Hungarian fluently, thus she is likely to go to an English —Hungarian congregation. There is a woman minister in my diocese, who is an American citizen. Her husband is a Calvinist preacher, who studied in the United States of America. They met there, and they came to live in Hungary. The wife learnt to speak Hungarian beautifully with great determination and willpower, and now serves as a Lutheran minister in Pilis. During my stay in Geneva I regularly worked with the Hungarian Protestant congregations of Geneva and Lausanne. I know what it means in a foreign country when hymns are sung, the sermon is preached and prayers are said, all in Hungarian. The native tongue is a close tie between the people in Hungary and those living far away. Hungarian congregations abroad can be vehicles of Hungarian culture, and enrich the life of other countries and peoples. I am convinced that the Church must always be aware of both local and the world-wide duties.” Regarding its size, the Hungarian Lutheran Church with about 400,000 faithful is in the third place behind the Roman Catholics and the Calvinists. Which are the traditional Lutheran areas? “Kemenesalja, Tolna and Baranya were such areas in Transdanubia. Many of the old congregations ceased to exist there after the war, following the expulsion of Germans. Counties Győr-Sopron and Vas are still Lutheran centres. With the exception of a few congregations in the border-zone, these are pure Hungarian communities. In County Békés, where Lutheranism is very strong, the ageing is a bigger problem than elsewhere since the young migrate from the villages because of the absence of industry. And I could mention also Counties Pest and Bács- Kiskun along with my home county, Nógrád.” Your work arouses much interest. How far can you satisfy that? “One of the difficulties is the shortage of ministers. The demographic problems of Hungary in the past decades are evident in this field as well. 1 do not think the proportion of those who hear the call is smaller, but since there are fewer in the age group as such the number of theological students also declines. We endeavour to make up for this through correspondence courses, volunteer church workers, presbyters and others, who undertake to serve as laymen. Since the basic principle of the Reformation was to ensure that all peoples can hear the gospel in their own language, we make available ministers speaking good German and Slovak to the congregations of national minorities. At the same time we ask the sister-Churches of neighbouring countries that they also make possible and assist the use of the native language in their Hungarian congregations. In this respect improvement of the existing situation is particularly needed in Transylvania. The reason why 1 have to underline this is that alarming information has come from there in recent years, for instance even the Bible is not allowed into Transylvania, if it is in Hungarian. I should like to encourage and help the spontaneous activities of communities. We are planning to survey our numbers and assets this year, for that is the only way to make plans in respect of the demographic changes. The traditional aspects of our work must be reorganized to suit needs: we must give additional support to large families, the elderly, the sick, the crippled and have tasks also in helping alcoholics, narcotics and the people who fled to us from Transylvania. Since young people are increasingly interested in religion we must also take great care of their instruction, providing suitable books. The text of my first sermon as a bishop was, with Verse 105 of Psalm 119: Thy word is lamp before my foot, the light of my path. In the name of God I could start work in a responsible position, as teacher and minister, in the hope that I was not walking my own way, but God’s word was the light before me. I also had in mind Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Word become Flesh, who called himself the light of the World. He will help me to do my duty, to which 1 was called by the love and trust of our congregations.” KLÁRA ZIKA GYULA JUHÁSZ Escape To flee? But whither? To our eyes how small This old world has become! If you should flee Up to the stars, you could not leave your eyrie. With us we bear the wall that seals us in. Blind as the seed that sprouts, and here we sleep In two old arm-chairs, like souls gone astray In the great labyrinth of the Universe, Two little links that bounced and rolled to lodge In this good corner in forgotten peace. Let us remain here calmly, my dear wife. Let us cast anchor on this friendly reef. Faithfully relish through the quiet years All these domestic objects, join ourselves To these the neighbouring and familiar links Of the great Chain—and then let us set out Passing our groping hands along these chairs And modest tables, like a sightless man. Who, in dim happiness, seeks out the voice That peoples with a soul his vibrant darkness. The spirit’s fingers with their Magi-nerves Caress with gliding touch the polished surface Of this our furniture and can divine, Behind the dead shell, Life, forever One. Creative, ageless, beyond time and space. Since there is naught so solid or so smooth But it can penetrate, as with crooked fingers The seedling through the seasons scrapes away The granite epidermis of the rocks. MILÁN FÜST Spring song, a roving song A breeze of springtime blows the apron of the cobbler Who in the crooked street, before his little shop Sits, with his work laid out and at the evening hour Is warming up the darkness with his lamplight. Heigh-ho, the time's capricious, roguish to the girls. The winds cool wave washes their ticklish necks. Heigh-ho, I am forgetting all my melancholy... My life I have abandoned to a dancing leaf An I, too, wander where the wind may take me!... FRIGYES KARINTHY Storm on the afternoon of april 2, 1927 Among the clouds of springtime, suddenly Something leaped like lightning—a zigzag clock-stroke. And the tocsin of the black sky began to resound an instant later. It had sounded only once And the tolling of my heart replied by a single beat: Tocsin, thanks for having taken note of me! Celestial wireless, thanks for having sent in every direction the S. 0. S. of my ship in distress! Thundering sky, thanks for having uttered this bellowing in my place! Perhaps God, or someone else, will hear it all the same. For I, I am only a man! I should bellow in vain. TWO POEMS. TRANSLATED BY WATSON KIRKCONNEL 31
