Journal index

The pastoral training and professional workshop named “Spirituality and Mission in the Church” held its conference titled “Spiritual Hunger 7.0” on March 2, 2023, at the Ráday House in Budapest. The topic of this was the problem of pastoral care. Márton Járay reported on the results of a survey conducted among Lutheran ministers in Hungary in his presentation titled “The Lost Shepherd - Lessons from a Pastoral Research”.

Zsigmond Varga, snr. was a pioneer in the field of Religious Studies in Hungary. His life and fate remarkably reflects and mirrors the history and fate of Hungary during the historically tense 20th century. The present study attempts to show the connections and reflections between Zsigmond Varga’s life-events and the historical tragedies and developments in Hungary. The seven decades of his life reflects five significant periods of Hungarian history from the very last golden age of Hungary during the end of the 19th century until the post-World War II communist era. The present study argues that the central issue of his legacy is the incorporation of the study of religions in the curriculum of theological training.

In the year 1859 the French Alphonse Esquiros made this remark in his itinerary: “Holland is one of the most religious countries of the earth; the Bible is really popular there.” In my lecture I outline the history of the personal and family reading of the Bible in the Netherlands during the last 5 centuries, including the current situation.Notable new research showed that in the Late Middle Ages in urban regions, in Holland as well, the Bible was spread in the national languages in wide circles of the society and was read among literate laymen. The Reformation built on this broadly recognisable interest or even hunger for the knowledge of the Bible. With the help of the newly discovered technique of printing and school teaching, and due to the fundamental reorientation of religious life through the Reformation – the Christian faith having only one source: the Bible – an intensive personal and family reading of the Bible began.