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“We have a terrible year behind us” and many circumstances make the celebration difficult, “but we cannot give up Christmas this year,” said Tamás Fabiny, president and bishop of the Hungarian Lutheran Church.
In his interview with MTI, Tamás Fabiny recalled that the first Christmas did not take place in idyllic conditions either, since the birth of Jesus was also overshadowed by external concerns, the danger of life, but the Christmas miracle occurred.
“This year, adapting to the circumstances, we have to try to celebrate in a more moderate, silent, no-frills way, but perhaps in a more authentic way,” he said.
“The forced cessation of life is a good opportunity to have more time for ourselves and our fellow men. And if we do that, we will have more time for God, ”he said.
He added: distance does not preclude personality, love can be expressed with a variety of gestures, a phone call, a letter.
The Lutheran leader also pointed out that the Greek word for pandemic is the combination of the prefix “pan-” which means “complete” and the word “demos” which means “people.” So, a pandemic is, on the one hand, the epidemic that afflicts all peoples and that now the world is suffering.
At the same time, we must not forget that there is now another “pandemic”: the birth of Jesus.
The bishop recalled: At the birth of Jesus, the angel in the field of Bethlehem said to the shepherds: “Do not fear, because behold, I announce to you a great joy that will be the joy of all the people.”
Speaking of the recent period, Tamás Fabiny said that in the first wave of the epidemic, in the spring, a kind of “lift” was felt in the church. The churches were closed for ten weeks, and the online services that took place during that time reached a surprising number of people, including those who would not otherwise attend church.
However, the enthusiasm waned for the second autumn cycle of the epidemic, people passed by with broadcasts and quarantine videos rushing towards them from everywhere. He warns that you cannot “push the message into the air,” saying, and then there will only be one who listens, but “you have to go back to addressing people one by one,” because there is no substitute for personality, he said.
He said communicating online also posed quality and content challenges for the church. The online presence alone is now very small, no one “fucks” when a pastor is on Facebook or if he also broadcasts a service on YouTube.
“If it is not formally good because, for example, the pastor’s face is only visible from below, or the image changes are bad, the sound is interrupted, the viewer ‘punishes immediately’ and leaves the broadcast,” he said.
Recognizing this, he explained, both the Lutheran World Federation and the Hungarian Church had recently tried to help pastors face new challenges with technical, IT and media courses.
Tamás Fabiny also noted that during the long months of the epidemic, disappointment can be seen in many areas.
“While people have applauded the work of health workers in the spring afternoons, lately they have been unfair to the doctors and nurses and feel helpless anger against them.”
That is why the Lutheran Church will deliver thousands of food packages to intensive care units at six major city hospitals between December 26 and January 2 to acknowledge the sacrificial work of skilled workers during the holidays, detailed.
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