Sárospataki Füzetek 13. (2009)
2009 / 4. szám - TANULMÁNYOK - Szatmári-Karmanoczki Emília: A magyar protestantizmus helyzete a 18. században, tekintettel a Patay-család egyházi szerepére
A magyar protestantizmus helyzete a 18. században, tekintettel a Patay-család egyházi szerepére Summary The Situation of Protestantism in Hungary in the 18th Century, in regard to the role of Family Patay in the Church The situation of Protestantism in the i8,h century Hungary may basically be described with two phenomena. One is the obtrusive counter-reformation of the Habsburg government, which meant, among other things, settling Catholic ethnic groups, excluding Protestants from state offices, requiring promissory-notes on baptism forced by the Catholic Church, banning the construction of Protestant churches, state penalty on people converting to Protestantism, forcing Protestant believers into ‘orphan ecclesiae’ and the subsequent withering of these. Only at the end of the century, during the reign of Joseph II and Leopold II, was the situation significantly amended. The other tendency in the life of the Protestant churches is institutionalising and strengthening the role of the lay element at church governance level, up the point that some received coequal positions with ministers in the Church Constitution. The increasing role and the institutionalising of the laity was comprehensible and necessary: the ministers of the repressed church communities could not protect either their own or their followers' rights to freedom of religion; consequently the role of noble patrons was appraised even more as they could still do a lot for their churches due to their social and legal positions, and by means of their riches. On the other hand, the tendencies in the governance of Hungary to repress the role and the power of the Diet (Assembly of the Orders) and the orders themselves, the absolutist policy of the Court in Vienna resulted in the drastic loss of opportunities of the nobility in public life. Subsequently when a Protestant nobleman in Hungary raised voice and proceeded in favour of the Church, he likewise enjoyed the opportunity of having role in public life. This was the time when the office of the general head-curators of both the Lutheran and the Reformed (Calvinist) Churches was brought to existence, followed by the election of the head-curators of the church districts and of the sub-districts. Only the nobility of the Protestants could - and did - take the responsibility to protect the Church against temporal authorities, or against the Roman Catholic Church bearing enormous power, and they were also capable of representing the Reformed Church at the Court in Vienna, as well as proceeding as agents (agens) at the Consilium Locumtenentiale, the Lieutenancy in Pozsony (today Bratislava in Slovakia), the de facto capital of Hungary that time. Besides they also took the responsibility of financing the operations of the Church and its schools. The Reformed Family Patay was such a noble family willing to make sacrifices and be at the service of others. Among their family members we find agens-es, head-curators of districts and of sub-districts, constructors of church buildings and parish-houses, and curators of schools during the century. Their lands were situated mostly in the Cistibiscan (Tiszáninneni) and Transtibiscan (Tiszántúli) Church Districts; these were the places where they Siiriispalaki Fflzrtek 121
