Fraternity-Testvériség, 1959 (37. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1959-11-01 / 11. szám

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FRATERNITY

The Counter-Reformation Continued

Meanwhile the Counter-Reformation was being furthered viciously. The people who were left pastor-less now suffered every form of persecution, and everywhere Roman priests and monks were introduced in place of the Reformed ministers. Many nobles compelled their peasants to turn to Rome. Prince Primate Szelepcsényi alone, according to the records, forced 63,000 persons into the Roman Church. The year book of the Jesuits for 1674 gives a glowing account of the activities of that order for the year, openly describing the forcible means that were used to bring about a return to Rome. Actually 343 Jesuits in Hungary and 11 in Transylvania were active in that year. But once again, by 1681 the Protestants had gathered enough strength to raise their voice in the national assembly, and this time they were aided by the personal intervention of Hamel Bruininx, the Dutch ambassador to the Habsburg Empire. Once again freedom of religion was put on the statute book, and once again all confiscated churches were required to be returned (but only if they had not already been dedicated to Roman Catholic worship). But again the agreement became a mere scrap of paper. However, this amount of success was reached that permission was given for one Reformed and one Lutheran church to be built in each county town of the land—as the only churches of those faiths in the whole country!

A year later came great things for Hungary, for the expulsion of the Turks began. A war of liberation was commenced and the Turks retreated from before the walls of Vienna. Then the momentum of the war increased, and finally in a few years more the Turks were driven right out of Hungary. But, of course, it now meant that the Reformed Church in the center and south came under all the disabilities from which the other regions were suffering.

The “Explanatio Leopoldina”

In 1691 there took place the Explanatio