"I was able to teach and educate at the same time" - we remember the Piarist Father István Jelenits.
Piarist monk István Jelenits, Széchenyi Prize-winning theologian, reorganizer of Catholic education, recipient of the Corvin chain, retired high school, college and university teacher has passed away - the Hungarian Province of the Piarist Order announced on its website on Thursday.
According to the announcement, István Jelenits passed away quietly on Thursday in the 92nd year of his life, the 70th year of his monastic life, and the 65th year of his priesthood "among his fellow religious, strengthened by the sacraments".
The order will provide information about his funeral later.
His life journey
According to his published biography, István Jelenits was born on December 16, 1932 in Berettyóújfalu, Hajdú-Bihar county. He graduated from the Budapest Piarist High School in 1951. In 1955, he graduated from the Hungarian department of the Eötvös Loránd University Faculty of Arts.
He entered the Piarist order in 1955, was ordained a priest four years later, and ordained a doctor of theology.
From 1960, he taught religion, as well as Hungarian language and literature at the Piarist high school in Kecskemét, and later in Budapest, until 2003.
From 1965, he also taught biblical subjects at the order's religious studies college in the capital, Kalazantinum, and from 2000 at its successor, the Sapientia Monastic Theological College.
Between 1985 and 1995, he was the provincial chief of the Piarist order in Hungary. From 1992 he taught for several years at the Piarist school in Göd, and from 1993 at the Piarist school in Vác, later also at the Vilmos Apor Catholic College in Vác.
From 1995, he was a teacher and head of the Department of Aesthetics at the Pázmány Péter Catholic University Faculty of Arts, and since 2015 he has been a professor emeritus.
Between 1993 and 1997, he was a member of the board of the National Council of Public Education, from 1998 to 2003 of the National Textbook Publishing Company, and since 1995 he was the president of the János Pilinszky Literature and Art Society.
His work and service were recognized with numerous awards, MTI reports.
I was able to teach and educate at the same time
In an interview with the Magyar Kurír two years ago, the Széchenyi Prize-winning Piarist monk, theologian, writer and teacher said, looking back on his half-century of self-sacrificing work as a teacher: " It was good to experience that the student is not a bag to be filled with knowledge, but a living , thinking person. I was able to teach and educate at the same time. It was a pleasure to be a partner in making young people from different life situations fall in love with the culture that shaped them. Windows opened in them and in front of them, which influenced the perspectives of their lives. I could see countless times how much this helped them shape their lives after their student years. "
He continued: " Man is a thinking being created in the image of God. Just as the Good Lord does not give up dealing with us, we must not give up working on ourselves and the other person either. It is the essence of our humanity. (…) We read and teach in a world in which we also live in amazement. In the end, we don't have to be able to transfer knowledge, but rather the responsibility of searching. And that this search is full of hope, even if we don't understand the secret of life, we see it completely. Life does not lead you along a precisely written course. Many times it may seem as if God is playing with us, while he does the exact opposite: he takes us seriously and has a lot of surprises in store for us to marvel at. "
These two quotes perfectly show the spirit of István Jelenits as a priest, monk and teacher.
He left, his Creator called him to him, but he was with us for 92 years, raised, taught, served his people and his Creator, and in the meantime, beautifully, quietly, concisely, as he was, he planted roses in wild fields to make the earth more beautiful!
Featured image: Piarist monk, theologian, teacher István Jelenits (Photo: MTI/Attila Kovács)
