Reformátusok Lapja, 1968 (68. évfolyam, 8-12. szám)

1968-10-01 / 10. szám

English Section

It Is Time For A New Reformation

In October our thoughts fly through the centuries and stop in Wittenberg, Germany. The date is October 31, 1517. W e see Martin Luther nailing his famous Ninety-five Theses on the door of the Castle Church so that lie might provoke thought and argument over the document.

From Wittenberg our thoughts fly on to the Saxon city of Worms. It is April 16, 1521. As wc stop here we again see the great Champion of the Reformation jolting into this city with a few friends to perform another daring deed in the purification process of the Church and in behalf of “The Faith and The Truth” held dear and defended by him. The Father of the Reformation had come here literally to cast himself before the fury of tlie Roman Catholic sovereigns. Embarrassed hatred had been generated by his daring exposure of the Church's deterioration. No matter what the fate before him, in Worms again, just as in Wittenberg, there was a regal air of conquest about his entry, reminiscent of Christ’s last kingly journey into Jerusalem.

The imperial eagle gleamed on the sleeve of the herald as he led the procession. Some two thousand people, many of them sympathizers, followed him to his lodging. The next day the royal marshal escorted the simple miner’s son, Martin, humble monk of the Church, into the presence of the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles, and his princes. For two days, without retracting a syllable of his faith, he fearlessly defended himself before the high council.

The tense finale of the trial came when the archbishop’s representatives, impatient to get the matter settled, shouted with an air of ultimacy: “I ask you, Martin,—answer candidly and without horns—do you repudiate your books and errors which they contain?”

Luther replied, “Since your majesty and your lord- ships desire a simple reply, I will answer without horns and without teeth. Unless 1 am convicted hv Scripture and plain reason —- 1 do not accept the authority of popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other — my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot do otherwise!”

There have been few of Luther’s spiritual and intellectual stature, hut many there have been — since that noble hour of Christian history — who have welcomed death rather than dilute the truth of God or forsake the Christ of the Cross.

As our thoughts fly back into the past and in our mind’s eye we see the historical events and outstanding personalities of the Reformation: Calvin, Zwingli and with them such champions of our own Reformed faith as Péter Méliusz Juhász, István Szegedi Kiss, Mihály

Sztárai, Gergely Szegedi, Albert Molnár Szenczi and others; suddenly our thoughts turn and we can’t help hut look into the present and observe the Church of Today. What does she look like? She seems to be a church which persists in trying to protect her members from the world rather than marching into every infected area of our present day society with the healing power of the Blessed Doctor, the Lord Jesus Christ; marching with all her bugles blaring distinctly the Good News. She seems to be a church which is too conscious of how her members look, rather than how they perform; a church which in some aspects of her life is concerned with the “most” rather than the “best”; a church which has not merely moved geographically to so-called better areas, but has unconsciously removed herself from the world, separated from culture and all the humbling responsibilities, in the present day church, we see that Christians have created two separate realms the realm of the secular — the world or culture; and the realm of the sacred — the Church. “It is almost as though Martin Luther had never lived and the Protestant Reformation had never happened . . .”.

IT IS TIME FOR A NEW REFORMATION! It has been made necessary by some of the same conditions which brought the original protest against the complacency and self-centeredness of the Church, our own Hungarian Reformed churches included.

The new Reformation is inescapable if the Church claims to be and wishes to continue to he the Body of Christ upon earth. But the new Reformation is not inevitable if it does not start right at home, right with us. Any faith which is adequate to meet the noises, the confusion, the uncertainty, temptations, strife and sorrow, the general chaos of our present age and generation will have its birth in the thrust of an honest and unselfish dedication, beginning with us, who are compelled by our living faith to follow where Christ leads. If we claim to be the heirs of Martin Luther, his contemporaries, and of our great Hungarian reformers as well, the extent of our rights to this claim and of our influence among our people and in the world is directly dependent upon the nature of the convictions that motivate our actions, our words and deeds.

The New Reformation will take place only if the same two original elements prevail: first, an eagerness to cleanse and purify the Church — to get her fully and intelligently related to the moral and spiritual life of our times; and second, a fresh reincarnation of Christ in her members who are personally and truly dedicated under the true and decent leadership of tile clergy to the principle and practice of Christian discipline, love, service and sacrifice. Here we stand; ive cannot do otherwise! Rev. Joseph Kecskemethy