Bishop Ferenc Bálint Benczédi of the Hungarian Unitarian Church declared the year of 2020 the Year of Responsibility. He did so on January 13, 2020, in honor of the 452nd anniversary of the Edict of Torda, the Declaration of Religious Freedom and Tolerance.
On January 12, the Hungarian Unitarian Church organized a commemoration of the event in the renewed Unitarian church in Torda/Turda. Katalin Újvárosi, minister from Székelymuzsna/Mujna, emphasized in her sermon that “wise and strong men build their houses themselves and their future on rock.” Bishop Francis David, who along with King John Sigismund played a significant role in the ratification of the law, was such a man, and his persona and work have been viewed as exemplary up until this day.
The Edict of Torda, from the year 1568, is closely linked to the founding of the Unitarian Church in Transylvania. It allowed for the first time the right for religious freedom and conscience and also the right of congregations to elect their own preachers. Because of this law, Transylvania became a land of religious freedom and denominational tolerance, providing shelter for people charged with heresy in other less-tolerant European countries. Central Europe thus set a model for the world 451 years ago.
Bishop Ferenc Bálint Benczédi emphasized in his speech that “we start the year in the spirit of the law on religious freedom of 1568, hoping that people living today can manage the lives of communities as wisely and with as much prescience as our ancestors did 452 years ago.” After the festive thoughts of host minister István Lajos Józsa, the congregation processed to the Memorial of the Torda Edict. On behalf of the Hungarian Unitarian Church, superintendents János Boros and Emőd Farkas and Bishop Ferenc Bálint Benczédi placed a wreath at the memorial.
On January 13, in the Unitarian church of the city center of Kolozsvár/Cluj-Napoca, Bishop Ferenc Bálint Benczédi said that in the new year he recommends a new slogan, not only for Unitarians, but for anybody who considers Unitarians as brothers. He emphasized that the quotation taken from James’s letters – “Faith without works is dead” – could be the primary motif of this year, one that inspires action and assistance. “This is why, while imagining putting this slogan on our flag, I pronounce the year 2020 as the Year of Responsibility.”
The church leader requested the members of the church, the assemblies, the church society organizations and the educational institutions to “wake up in ourselves the sense of responsibility and act in order that the universal love proclaimed by Jesus not remain only a law spoken out loud but become a reality.”
As a continuation of the celebration, János Márkus Barbarossa, maker and restorer of musical instruments, offered the 400th violin made by him and also two other string instruments to the church. Violinist Anna Dénes then played an interpretation of Jules Massenet’s opus Meditation, accompanied by Ilka Borbála Fodor.
The synod of the Hungarian Unitarian Church declared in 2002 that the 13th of January be the Day of Religious Freedom, after which the Parliament of Hungary on February 20, 2018, unanimously accepted the law, calling “On the importance of the Edict of Torda of the year 1568 and that of the Day of Religious Freedom.” The Parliament also officially declared January 13th a Memorial Day.
Featured photo: Memorial of the Torda Edict
Photo credits: Hungarian Unitarian Church
