Magyar Egyház, 1995 (74. évfolyam, 1-4. szám)
1995 / 1. szám
12. oldal MAGYAR EGYHÁZ in the divine life. The ethics that Paul advocates is an ethics of participation in the Spirit of divine love. It lies at the heart of Paul’s understanding of Communion. As we commune with God’s spirit of love, the Body of Christ flourishes and grows. When each part is working properly, it “makes bodily growth and upbuilds itself in love” (Ephesians 4:15-16). This is why Paul warns us of the dire consequences of not properly discerning the true nature and intent of the Communion sacrament (I Corinthians 11:28- 29). Jesus himself cautions us, “abide in my love” (John 15:9). If we do not abide in this saving love that is God, we are cast forth as a branch and we wither and die (John 15:6) Jesus as divine love incarnate shows forth in his being the full intent and aim of the Law and the Commandment: “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:12). Thus, Paul instructs us to “walk in love, as Christ loved us” (Ephesians 5:2). And John declares, “this is the commandment, as you have heard from the beginning, that you follow love” (II John 6). It is so very crucial to a proper Christian understanding of deity that we do not envision or think of God as pure power in the abstract. The infinite power that is God has a specific and concrete nature, love! This is the true Christian understanding of divine reality. And here we are not talking about human love, the often misguided and thoroughly imperfect human capacity to express love. When we compare human love with all of its ambiguities to divine love expressed in the person of Jesus Christ, it is easy to see that a Fall has indeed taken place and the image of God that all things were created in has been darkened throughout. It is only by the grace of God’s love for us all that we are saved and transfigured back into that image from which we have fallen, “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed into his likeness from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit” (II Corinthians 3:18). My personal prayer for us all this Lenten season is best contained in these words of Paul: “that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have the power to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:17-19). From all of your fellow brothers and sisters in the Hungarian Reformed Church of Duquesne, and myself: Have a most joyful and Godfilled Easter! The Rev. Dr. Michael David Sickels Hungarian Reformed Church of Duquesne 'és'#* CASES OF LANGUAGE AND ETHNICITY IN CHURCHES IN AMERICA AND HUNGARY (HRCA-Eastern Classis Annual Meeting, Roebling, NJ, March 5, 1995) People of the Hungarian Reformation in the 16th century put the command of Jesus into practice: “Go into the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation” (Mark 16:15b) Hungary was part of the world and Hungarians part of the creation: the Bible had to be translated into Hungarian so that not only the learned people but all people would understand God’s message. There is no need for me to retell the stories of the Bibletranslations into Hungarian from Janos Sylvester’s New Testament and Gáspár Karoli’s Vizsolyi Biblia up to the most recent new translation by the Hungarian Bible Council. Hungarian Reformed people in this wide world use the Bible in the Hungarian language in all areas of their church life. In Australia and in New Zealand, in South America, in France, in Belgium, in the Netherlands, in Great Britain, in Germany, in Switzerland, in Austria, in Italy, in the succession states (as we call them) that is in Transylvania, in the Parts West and North of Transylvania, in Bácska, in Croatia, in Slovenia, in Slovakia, in the Carpatho-Ukraine and in the United States of America and Canada. Together with the Hungarian language Bible they use the Bible in the languages of the respective lands: English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Flemish, Dutch, German, Italian, Roumanian, Serbian, Slavonian (not Slovenian), Croatian, Slovak, Ruthenian and American- English. In all these countries where there are Hungarian based Reformed churches, Hungarian language worship, church administration, religious instruction through the centuries and particularly through the last hundred years have become mixed with the languages of the new homeland; in various measure Hungarian and the local language have gradually merged, blended. In some Hungarian and the indigenous language still exist side by side together with various degrees of faithfulness to Hungarian historical heritage and to Hungarian national consciousness. Linguistic differences within a congregation go together with differences in ethnicity. The differences in ethnicity show a wide range of emotional attitude—from friendly cooperative to bloody hostility. We are witnessing tragic examples in Hungarian-Roumanian relations, also in the ethnic cleansing situation in the Vojvodina, in the killings and destructions in the Baranya area and in Slavonia (not in Slovenia) then not as bloody but still oppressive in Slovakia.
