The Alagi Szent Imre Egyházközség greeted its former parish priest, Father József László Szabó, on the occasion of his 70th birthday at the thanksgiving mass and the agape that followed.
Dr. László Farkas, the parish priest of the Szent Imre Church, revived the rich history of Father József’s seventeen years of service in Dunakeszin from 1998 to 2015. The father came to Dunakeszi with his experience as deputy director in the first five years of the Fényi Gyula Jesuit High School built in Miskolc. He was greeted by a parish building that had become uninhabitable and a disintegrated, dwindling community that had been operating without its own parish priest for five years. He started construction, which became the defining activity of his seventeen years at Alago, both spiritually and physically.
He expanded the parish building and created a community hall, providing the opportunity to organize lectures, Bible classes, spiritual exercises, and cultural programs. In 2006, the St. John’s Chapel in Nepomuk was renovated for the centenary of the building, at which time Tibor Bráda’s mosaic entitled: Christ the Teacher was completed in the arched triangle above the entrance of the chapel, which is still the most beautiful and valuable work of art in the city. The roof of the Szent Imre church was renewed. In 1999, he launched the Dunakeszi Organization of the Association of Christian Intellectuals (KÉSZ), the choir, the orchestra, and the school were founded. He organized domestic and foreign trips and led several trips to Rome and Mariazell. Excursions, bike rides, joint soccer games, summer camps, day camps, and kayak tours were regular. The Szent Imre Scout Team was founded.
Residential parks were built and expanded at a rapid pace in the underground part of the city. Young married people and families with small children arrived, the parish became younger and increased in number. At the same time as the creation of the KÉSZ group, Father József identified the establishment of a Catholic kindergarten as a long-term goal. Unlike the surrounding settlements, Dunakeszin did not yet have a single church-maintained educational institution. In 2011, the Szent Erzsébet Catholic Kindergarten, providing Christian education to 152 children, was opened. In the meantime, Father József’s books were published one after the other. The news of the high quality of his teachings and sermons attracted many people from other settlements to the Szent Imre church. The sustaining power of his community-building charisma created a timeless, active community.
In the homily of the thanksgiving Mass, he testified about his life journey with the humility of his strong faith. By making a philosophical distinction between cleverness and wisdom, he shed a special light on these two virtues. Cleverness can be acquired with the right abilities, that is, it is the result of human performance, which can often cause trouble and confusion. Wisdom cannot be acquired by man, it is a gift from God that must be accepted. Wisdom is the golden covering of the decisions of those on the right path.
At the end of the Mass, László Kecskeméti, the secular president of the parish, greeted Father József and handed over the faithful’s gift, a vigorous tulip tree sapling with beautiful foliage, whose rapid and vigorous growth, beauty, and the autumnal splendor of its foliage is a symbol of the enrichment of Szent Imre Parish together with the father he lived for seventeen years.
The celebratory community, moving to agape, filled the reception spaces of Szent Erzsébet Catholic Kindergarten. The head of the institution, Anikó Pandur, thanked the kindergarten for the opportunity created by the Christian education of young children, and for the formation of their parents as a community. Ildikó Módli, the defining personality of the founding kindergarten teachers (currently an employee of the Catholic Pedagogical Institute), recalled the memorable episodes and fond memories of the first ten years in her welcome speech.
Zsófi Kulcsár and Fruzsina Kulcsár remembered representing the former “occupying” kindergarten students. Anikó Csákó and Márton Tóth, on behalf of the parents of the current kindergarten students, thanked Father József László Szabó for the beautiful, modern building of the Szent Erzsébet Kindergarten, crowned with a miniature version of the Zsolnay-glazed tower of the St. they can grow in the Catholic faith, experiencing God’s love.
After the toast and table blessing sung together with Father Laci, the greetings and delicious conversations continued around the tables spread with the special delicacies of the Schieszl Vendéglő. The long-awaited meetings and the joy of seeing each other connected the celebrated and the celebrants with overflowing love.
Katalin the bell ringer
Photo: István Bea
