Prakfalvi Endre: Roman Catholic Churches in Unified Budapest - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2003)

The Parisch Church of Blessed Özséb, 1987

the religious point of view (1 believe in my own way). Church membership is an essential condition of salvation—extra eccieiiam nuiia ialui (there is no salvation outside the Church), as St. Cyprian 0-258) declared. Likewise, the future church was meant, in the words of the primate, "to profess, through the saints, the omnipotence of God, and our faith in the future of the Hungarian nation".

The church in Békásmegyer was not meant to be either post-modern or organic, nor is its design in the shape of a yurt; instead, it was intended to evoke the spirit of the 13th century "in today's idiom", as the architect summed up his philosophy. Covering the square layout is a Romanesque dome on pendentives supported on three corner points, just as the teachings of the Church are based upon its foundations, the four Gospels, according to László Csaba, interpreting his own work. The liturgical space is arranged along the east-west diagonal, with the altar standing in the western angle. The four-fold, rhomboid, open-truss roof of glued wood, leaping skyward from the triangular aisle walls, caps a "lofty” space. The effect is reinforced by the glass, rather than opaque, substance of the walls on the two main, entrance-side, fronts.

The building was structurally engineered by Kálmán Z. Horváth, the ornamental wood-carvings were made by Judit Kopp, the mosaics of the Calvary by János Pleidel and the crucifix is the work of Győző Sikota. The foundation stone was blessed by Nuncio Poggi in October 1985, and the church itself was consecrated by László Paskai, the new Archbishop of Esztergom, in September 1987.

The doors, which feature orders of arches and jambs, are a Romanesque allusion, even though the tympanum is somewhat out of character. The inscription above reads: Venue adoremus, In cruce salus (Come, let us adore; the Cross is our salvation).

Another work by László Csaba is the church built in Cserépváralja, a village in the Bükk Hills (1959—61). The building is regarded as a milestone in the recent history of Hungary's ecclesiastical architecture. He also made, in cooperation with Sára Cs. Juhász, designs for the St. Joseph Home built in Béke tér, Csepel, in the early 1990s; there the static engineer was Zsolt Csurda. The altarpiece and the Calvary in the chapel were made by the renowned church painter Péter Prokop.

73