Magyar Egyház, 1980 (59. évfolyam, 1-10. szám)

1980-03-01 / 3-4. szám

10

MAGYAR EGYHÁZ

GENOCIDE IN ROMANIA

Born in Székelyudvarhely and serving through the end of 1944 as a pastor in the Hungarian Reformed Church in Transylvania (Erdély), it was impossible for me today not to think of what would have happened to me in case I would have stayed in Transylvania. I have just finished reading the 209-page hook, Witnesses To Cultural Genocide — First-Hand Reports on Romania’s Minority Policies Today.

As I read the book, again I felt that due to my keen sense of justice and outspokenness, the Romanians would have long ago and mercilessly done away with me, just as they killed many thousands of other Hungarians since 1945.

But they could not massacre more than three million Hungarians and more than one million other minority nationals, Germans, Turks, Bulgarians, Gypsies, Jews, Serbs, Slovacs and Ruthenians. For this reason they launched a forced Romanization of the minorities, on a thoroughly contrived and stubbornly executed plan. They have been committing cultural genocide against them.

In the quoted book first-hand reports and data are published about the genocide committed against the Hungarians in Romania. The Romanian government gradually decreased the number and quality of Hungarian language schools. They have excluded the Hungarians from leadership in the economy, even to their own determent. They allow no Hungarian political activity. They force Hungarian intellectuals to accept jobs in the Romanian speaking areas, while they have been settling only Romanian speaking intellectuals, administrators and workers in the Hungarian speaking territores. They allow Hungarian newspapers to publish only translations from the Romanian press. They almost annihilated the activity of the Hungarian theatres. For more than three million Hungarians there is no permanent radio and television. “In Romania you may not be able to purchase a ticket at the railroad station unless you ask for it in Romanian... You may not be served in a store if you speak in Hungarian, German, or in a Slavic language... If someone answers the telephone in Hungarian (“Halló!”) and not in Romanian (“Alo!”l, he may he insulted as being called a fascist at the other end of the line. .. 1 saw a Romanian woman on the Székely Circular Railway attack a young minority mother because she spoke to her children in their native language. .. If a member of a minority breaks into song in a public place, he will soon be rebuked with : ‘Sing in the language of the State, not the language of tramps.’ ”

These few quotations cite only the “smaller” manifestations of the continually practiced cultural genocide in Romania. During my ministry in Bucharest in 193-7-40, when with my wife we walked the streets of the Romanian capital and talked in our native Hungarian, we repeatedly had to suffer such snarls coming from behind our back: “Vorbiti Romaneste” (“Speak in Romanian”). Yet, the situation of the Hungarians at that time and now in Romania cannot be compared, it is now so much worse.

Here I do not want to discuss this subject lengthily. I only wanted to call the attention of the readers to the recently published book and to ask them to buy it, read it and spread its contents. By disclosing the tragic lot of fellowmen in Romania, perhaps they can help them. Donate the book to your schools or libraries or give it to influential persons.

The Witnesses To Cultural Genocide can be ordered for $14 from 1. The American Transylvanian Federation, P.O. Box 1671, Grand Central Station, New York, N.Y. 10017, or, 2. Committee For Human Rights In Romania, P.O. Box “J”, Gracie Station, New York, N.Y. 10028.

Béla Szigethy

The “TRANSYLVANIAN QUARTERLY” published by the U.S. Branches of the Transylvanian World Federation, Dr. Albert Wass and István Zolcsák, editors, appears as a supplement in the Eighth Tribe, a bilingual monthly publication. Yearly subscription is $10.00; $12.00 in Canada. Eighth Tribe, P.O. Box 637, Ligonier, Pa. 15658.

21st ANNUAL CONFERENCE

OF

CHURCH WOMEN UNITED

OF THE

HUNGARIAN REFORMED CHURCH IN AMERICA — EASTERN AREA

Sunday, May 18, 1980 at the

Hungarian Reformed Church of Carteret, N.J.

175 Pershing Ave., Carteret, N.J.

Theme: “God’s Covenant With Man And World In The Eighties.”

English and Hungarian Speaker —

Rev. Dr. Andrew Harsanyi

Registration: 2:00 P.M. — Fee: $5.00 Fellowship Supper — 6:00 P.M.

All women of the New York and Eastern Classis are cordially invited to attend. Please reserve this date and plan to come and share an afternoon in Christian fellowship with each other.