We can become the renovated church of Europe, where people come to draw strength, said the President of the Republic on Sunday at the rededication of the Church of St. George in Ják.

According to the President of the Republic, our communities need to be renewed.

"We need to rebuild each other, putting aside all obstacles, fears, insecurities, mistrust, although this is not easy in an age of infidelity, in which we lose the grace of connection."

After that, Tamás Sulyok said in the episcopal palace in Szombathely, in the world of atomization and fragmentation, in which we are witnessing the breakdown of the family, the erosion of communities, the rise of loneliness, the abandonment of moral values, we are thirsty for sustaining communities.

Tamás Sulyok: We should be proud

According to the head of state, people yearn for the spiritual surplus, for the closeness of God in this "barrenness" , because both faith and love can be lived in community. Then Tamás Sulyok believed that it is necessary to find the possibility of how we can be "living stones, connecting mortars" , how we can reorganize into a community, serve each other and broadcast the good news.

Tamás Sulyok added that grassroots organizations, autonomous initiatives that encourage joint thinking and action must be valued, and the creation of new communities must be supported. "The renovated church is not only a legacy of our ancestors, but also a manifestation of the fact that Hungarians appreciate, preserve and nurture what they have inherited, the result of the unity of Hungarian society." He stated:

we can be proud that in Hungary there is still the will, intention and sufficient resources to renew the churches.

Praising the church, he stated that it is an ornament to Hungary and the entire Carpathian basin, which preserves the imprint of the thousand-year-old Hungarian Christianity, and therefore should be preserved and presented.

Then Zsolt V. Németh, the government representative of the region, said that the government, which professes Christian principles, strives to devote its attention and financial resources to what it sees as good, useful and pleasing to God based on its values. He thanked the government for announcing a program for the renovation of churches, and included Jaki among the 3,700 churches to be renovated as part of this.

At the end of the mass, the remains of the founder, Márton Jáki Nagy, were placed in the crypt of the church. The Hungarian National Committee of ICOMOS awarded the St. George Church in Ják with the ICOMOS Award for the restoration of the former Benedictine abbey church. The restoration of the Szent György Church in Ják began in 2018 and was realized with more than HUF 2 billion in government support, MTI concluded.

Featured image: In the image published by the Sándor Palace, President of the Republic Tamás Sulyok and County Bishop János Székely of Szombathely in the Episcopal Palace of Szombathely on April 21, 2024. MTI/Sándor Palace