There is a strong demand for spiritual care among young people.
A thousand Reformed young people from Transylvania, Hungary and Subcarpathia participated in Zeteváral, Hargita County, organized by the Christian Youth Association (IKE) for the sixth time, Change direction! festival between August 4 and 8. Apetroae Lucas-Matteo, IKE executive director and main organizer, reported on the main benefits of the meeting.
The discussion of issues that could be regarded as taboo topics, pastoral care and special prayer opportunities were among others organized by the Christian Youth Association (IKE) for the sixth time, Change direction! At a festival named. Young people from Transylvania, Hungary and Transcarpathia took part in the meeting held in Zeteváralja, Hargita County, with the participation of a thousand Reformed young people.
Apetroae Lucas-Matteo, the executive director of the Cluj-Napoca-based IKE, spoke to Krónika about the main benefits of the meeting held at the beginning of August. The main organizer was born in Székelyudvarhely and just finished his master's degree in corporate financial management in Cluj, and will continue to work in the treasured city in the future. As he said, the thirty-two-person organizing staff of the event organized every two years was joined by another hundred volunteers, and 85 programs were implemented in three days, and four more were made permanently available to the participants. Such were the invisible theater, the prayer tent, spiritual care and the prayer path.
Photo: Change direction - IKE Festival/Facebook
The main organizer summed up the main benefits of this year's festival as follows:
"It's good to see when something becomes tangible. We moved out. We thought. We met. We talked. We were nervous. We traveled. We didn't sleep. We built. We waited. We had fun. We planned. We asked. We answered. We have redesigned. We prayed.”
As he said, mainly young people between the ages of 14 and 18 came mainly from Transylvanian churches, but there were also university students, and a group of 50 came from Transcarpathia.
As he explained, among their guests were pastors, lecturers, and university students majoring in psychology, who held lectures and participated in round-table discussions.
"Among our permanent programs, I would like to highlight the one called the invisible theater, it is actually a prepared space where the participants enter blindfolded and a biblical story is presented to them through their senses, it reaches them through smell, touch, speech - so it is sensitizing, so to speak.
The participants don't have to do anything in the invisible theater, they just enter blindfolded and the guides walk them through. Spiritual care is also closely related to the invisible theater, as there is usually a great demand for spiritual care, as these are stories that can be moving and upsetting," said the main organizer.
The name of the spiritual care program was Vár-lak and the organizers introduced it because they realized that young people need personal conversations and often do not have the opportunity to do so.
"We feel that in our country it is a bit taboo to consult a counselor, so we wanted to encourage young people to do so. Pastors and psychology students performed the pastoral work at the meeting. Two other spiritual programs awaited the young people: the prayer tent and the prayer path - these are actually pre-prepared prayer routes with formulated thoughts that you could walk along and think about, and there was also the opportunity to pray. These were individual programs where you could go through them individually"
said the main organizer.
He also touched on the history of the festival, reviving that this was now the sixth, the first one was organized in Szóvata in 2012, then in the same place in 2016. In 2018, it was held in Nagyenyed, in 2020 it could not be organized due to the coronavirus epidemic, then in 2022 and again this year in Zeteváralja, and according to the plans, the venue will be in the same place in 2026.
Regarding the program, Apetroae Lucas-Matteo also said that devotions were held in the morning, and discussions, lectures, round table discussions, and workshops awaited the participants during the day. Among other things, there was a lot of talk about addictions: Éva Bartha| a clinical psychologist gave a presentation on behalf of the Bonus Pastor Foundation, a round table discussion was held with the participation of young people from Transcarpathia: they did not politicize, but talked about how they live everyday in the war-torn country.
Photo: Change direction - IKE Festival/Facebook
Pastor-turned-chef Sándor Berke held a cooking workshop, and then the participants were able to take part in the discussion "As a Christian in the corporate business sphere", in addition to this, they could also listen to the lecture of pastor János Bustya, which was entitled "Sexuality and love in the Bible".
"Therefore, we also tried to find topics that, although young people hear less about, are very interested in them.
Beke Boróka's presentation entitled "Networks in the Church" was also like this, and we have a collaboration with the Synod of the Reformed Church of Hungary, and Dóra Gulyás was the guest of the Synod, who gave a talk together with Richárd Kiss under the title, "In Connection with the Youth," listed the main organizer. He also highlighted that the feedback from the participants revealed to the organizers that there is indeed a need for events of this kind, where several church groups can meet, but also for spiritual programs and deep conversations.
"The small group discussions at the end of each day were a novelty, when the participants talked about the topics that arose that day under the leadership of the pastors. Quote The important keyword is that this meeting moves us, this refers to the fact that we are mainly looking for answers to the questions of how God moves us in everyday life, how he moves us into a community, a youth group, and a large how to move out of our comfort zone at a community festival. The devotions and small group discussions and part of the lectures were also based on this topic"
said the main organizer.
The event is considered unique in several respects, partly because it is a festival that everyone undertakes to organize as a voluntary service.
Featured image: Apetroae Lucas-Matteo, managing director of IKE, main organizer at the festival Photo: Change direction - IKE Festival/Facebook
