Bethlen Évkönyv, 1993-1996 (Ligonier)

Zoltán D. Szücs: Our churches and our federation

the ocean back and forth a half-a-dozen times. In the early 1900’s they topped the list of the American statistical figures of the “migrating birds”. The heartless free-market economy in America did not pay much attention to the sick, the unemployed, the handicapped, the widows or orphans. The menu of the day was industrial competition and the fast accumulation of wealth. Protective labor laws or social concern had to take a back seat to these aims. The farm worker or small farmer, who came here from Hungary, had unlimited opportunities of work in this land of a rapidly growing industrial giant. They could earn well, and they did, prompted by their strict work ethics and their dreams. Yet they were unprotected, used and misused and very vulnerable. These conditions set the stage for the birth of our Hungarian Reformed Churches as well, as for the birth of our Federation.

The labour pains were there. The situation was ripe. The needs were self-evident. Something had to happen, and it did. Half-a-dozen committed Hungarian Reformed pastors organized Reformed congregations by 1895. The first Hungarian Reformed worship service in the United States was conducted by The Reverend Gedeon Acs, who came to the states with Louis Kossuth. Then came 30 years of fasting, until The Reverend Ferenc Kecskemethy arrived in New York on September 15, 1881 and held worship services at Union College, then at the Cooper Institute, but being disillusioned by apathy and difficulties, returned to Hungary after a short stay. The First Hungarian and Slovak Evangelical and Reformed St. Paul Church was organized in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on April 6, 1890 with Gusztáv Hamborszky Veg as their Chief Elder. It survived by barely a year. The first active Hungarian Reformed minister in this land was The Reverend Gusztáv Jurányi, who arrived in Cleveland on the 12th of October, 1890. He was followed by The Reverend Ferenc Ferenczy, in the fall of 1893, to Pittsburgh and by The Reverend Sándor Harsanyi, a year later, to Cleveland, because Rev. Jurányi moved to Trenton, and by The Reverend Gabor Dokus, at the same time organizing the South-Norwalk-Bridgeport congregation. Two years later The Reverend Bertalan Demeter came to be the pastor of the New York congregation and The Reverend Sándor Kalassay pastor of the Mt. Carmel congregation.

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