Magyar Egyház, 1994 (73. évfolyam, 1-4. szám)
1994 / 3. szám
8. oldal MAGYAR EGYHÁZ GOD’S WORD ALL OVER THE WORLD The Holy Scriptures were translated into 44 new languages in 1993 bringing to 2062 the number of languages in which at least one book of the Bible is available. The complete Bible can be read in 337 languages. However as there are 6000 languages spoken throughout the world thousands of more translations are to be done. India has 1652 different languages of which only 170 have some part of the Bible translated. The Bible or portions of the Bible are available in 189 European, 71 North American, 341 Pacific, 513 Asian and 358 Central and Latin American languages. (EPS, ABS) A Letter to the WARC IT IS A MIRACLE THAT—BY GOD’S GRACE—WE STILL DO EXIST On the 11th of April this year the European Area Committee of World Alliance of Reformed Churches (WARC) held its meeting in Drienovec, Slovakia. On this occasion a statement was composed which sharply criticized and rejected the initiative aiming to set up the Universal Hungarian Reformed Synod. Among other things this document affirmed that ~this Church initiative could be seen as an encouragement to go behind the realities of 1920” and accuses the initiating Hungarian-speaking Churches of “misuse of Christian faith for national ethnic purposes.” The affected Churches have returned an answer to this document in all detail and have rejected the insinuating and anxious statements of the European Area Committee. Though our Churches do not doubt the sympathy the World Alliance of Reformed Churches shows towards us they consider this suspicion and mistrust regarding our Universal Synod a complete misconception. At this moment I do not want to deal in detail with the pros and cons of the WARC and of the member Churches in question, I only want to dwell on the critical remarks on national ethnic issues. First of all I firmly reject those veiled allusions which charge us with irredentism. We Hungarian-speaking Reformed people have had to live kept apart from each other and as strangers among other peoples for more than 75 years. Almost half of the believers of our Church have been compelled to suffer the wrongs of oppressive nationalistic regimes (Romania, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union) whose politics aimed at their destruction and have severely tried their endurance and faith—in addition our Reformed Church as a whole has been subject to Communist atheism for about 50 years. After the dark decades of oppression affecting both our ethnicity and our faith it is a miracle that— by God’s grace—we still do exist Considering all this we feel deeply offended and upset by the fact that the Hungarian Reformed people who have been oppressed, persecuted for their faith, deprived of their properties, human and minority rights are now groundlessly accused and treated with suspicion by their brothers and sisters in Christ. We do not intend to blame the World Alliance of Reformed Churches and our brothers and sisters living in prosperity and liberty for their “diplomatically” silent and mostly unconcerned attitude from the past We who live in minority status have learned long since that “those little ones” can only reckon on the concern and grace of Christ. Neither are we going to be ungrateful and forget about the charity of the sister Churches of the Western countries and about their readiness to help which we have experienced especially during the last years. We cannot accept, however, that the project of the Universal Synod arising from the elementary need of the minority Hungarian Reformed Churches for solidarity and fellowship be queried or even defamed. You should remember the fact that our minority Churches are still afflicted with the aggressive majority nationalism in the countries where they live, and as such they are endangered in their existence. That is one of the reasons which makes the Reformed Church of Hungary support them morally and spiritually—also by means of the Universal Synod. We consider it very strange that while we are speaking about reconciliation of nations and religions and while there is nothing to prevent ecumenical relationships between different denominations, our solidarity with “those who belong to the family of believers,” with the Hungarian Reformed people gives rise to suspicion and repugnance throughout the world. The point under discussion is however nothing more than the warning we read in the letter to the Galatians: “Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers” (Cal. 6:10). It could be seen as the irony of fate that those who belong to the Western Reformed “family of believers” involuntarily charge us with the same thing as—for instance—the extreme nationalist Romanian gutter press does namely: Ethnic political purposes, or even irredentism. I have written this letter in the spirit of Christian frankness and I would like to end it with the wish that our sister Churches of other countries should not hinder the process of revival of our scattered and oppressed Reformed Church communities. They should rather support our efforts, which spring from faith and synodical considerations and go beyond the national boundaries. Dr. László Tokes Dr. László Tokes Bishop of Kiralyhagomellek RO 3700 Oradea (Nagyvarad) Str. Cralovel Nr. 1 Romania Editor's note: The above article has been reprinted from the Christian Observer.
