Magyar Egyház, 1953 (32. évfolyam, 1-10. szám)
1953-01-01 / 1. szám
12 MAGYAR EGYHÁZ I heard the call to prayer from one of the minarets. I saw the muezzin in his little railed-in balcony, illuminated by the first light of the sun, an old blind man who cries in a loud chanting voice: "Allahu akbar, Allahu akbar, Allahu akbar. . . ashadu an la ilaha. . . illa-llah, ashadu anna. . . Muhamadarrasulullah. . . hayya alas sala. . .” "Allah is great: testify that there is no God but Allah and Mohammed is his prophet. . . Come to pray. . . Come to pray!” And as he calls he does not cup his hands to his mouth as artists have painted him, but holds them behind his ears with the palms to the front and his fingers up. Zoltán Beky oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo IN □ U R TIME By Stephen Szőke oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo With this issue the "Magyar Church” receives a new outward appearance; the size of the pages is larger than previously and the new front page not only makes the paper more pleasant to look at, but it manifests an all around rejuvenation. The external form is an outward expression of the internal changes. We welcome any comments concerning these changes, both inward and outward, that have taken place. Our aim is to give our readers more and diverse reading material, and serve the two main groups of our people proportionately. KEEP CHRIST IN CHRISTMAS With this and similar slogans (like, "Put Christ Back into Christmas”) a great many community campaigns took place all over the country during the Advent season past. If the indications are correctly interpreted, these isolated ventures may attain the proportions of a national movement in this and the coming years. If it ever reaches that and if we hope to show real results, many great problems have to be solved. This is not only a religious problem. The business end of the overall picture is more problematic inasmuch as almost one-third of a year’s retail business is concentrated in the Christmas sale. If we are to de-commercialize Christmas, that volume of business must be shifted to another spot (certainly not to another religious holiday). The celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ and the Santa Claus cult should be separated, as it is done in Europe where St. Nicholas comes on the sixth of December. Naturally this would not mean the elimination of the Christmas trade since, even then, great many gifts would be exchanged on Christmas, it would decentralize or defocus the commercialized part of the season. Then, let the loudspeakers blast out "Rudolph the Red-Nose Reindeer” or "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” weeks before December sixth, and leave alone "Silent Night” and "Joy to the World” and the rest of the sacred carols. These sacred hymns, of course, belong not only to the Church but also into the individual and family life and worship, but they do not belong to the business world which profane even that which is most sacred. And finally, or perhaps first of all, let the churches celebrates the birth of Christ as our own Hungarian and other nationality churches do. We are not satisfied with having "Christmas” as the topic of the sermon on Sunday before December twenty-fifth, as if it were another Boy Scout Sunday or World Order Sunday, but remember that great event in history on Christmas Day, and even then, after proper preparatory services. And why should the American Protestants not have Communion Services on Christmas, as we do, remembering the Lord’s death even on his birthday—emphasizing that He was born for us in human form to die for us under the weight of human sin. Let us put Christ back into Christmas! SELF-SATISFACTION We must be on the alert, self-satisfaction is a dangerous thing. I am sure, most of us feel some self-satisfaction about the way we commemorate the birth of Christ (see above), or the way we increase our contributions to the church from year to year. We must not say, with the Pharisee, "God, I thank thee that I am not like other men.” It is true that our Church provides us the opportunities for real Christmas worshipping, but this fact alone is not enough. That, too, may become a mere formality, even tiresome formality for some. The fact, that we worship more often during the season than most of our brethren in America, alone does not make us better Christians. One can not measure the privilege of Christian worship and fellowship in a legalistic way; there must be a deep-down feeling of need for those "extra” evening and holiday services, expressing this feeling with our regular participation in them. In this month of January we have heard many good ra ports of our member-congregations, especially financial reports. There are two main reasons for this; one, there is a definite trend among out people to express their support of our churches above and beyond the set minimums— making their voluntary contributions a real offering, and second, the higher income of our churches is simply a natural part of our high cost of living—realizing that the expenses of our congregational life increase, too. In our evaluation of these facts we should make sure that our regular weekly offering is a worthy expression of our faith in the Lord and in His cause on earth. And in that respect there can be no self-satisfaction. The word should be, Strive on!
