Presbyterian Church in Ireland - Mission Overseas - CENTRAL EUROPE: Leaders-in-Training settling in at UTC

13th October 2009

In September, we welcomed two ethnic Hungarians to Belfast for the start of a year of study at Union Theological College (UTC) aimed at helping each of them in their personal development for future ministry and leadership within the Reformed Church in Hungary, and in Transylvania in Romania.

Rózsa Drabik is a student for the ordained ministry in the Hungarian Reformed Church (HRC).

Having spent five years studying Theology at Debreceni Református Hittudományi Egyetem (the Theological Seminary of the Reformed Church located in Debrecen in Hungary), this year at UTC Rózsa is focusing on Pastoral Care, taking courses on Pastoral Theology and The Church, Society & Ministry.

Arrangements have been made for Rózsa to link up with McQuiston Memorial Presbyterian Church, in East Belfast.

Rózsa’s particular interest ‘back home’ is in helping to ‘build bridges’ between the Romani, or Gypsy people and the majority Hungarian population; she also has leanings towards chaplaincy work. Whilst this is her first visit to Ireland, she has travelled to Austria, and has also undertaken short placements in both Holland and England.

When she returns to Hungary next summer, Rózsa expects to take up an Assistantship in a local HRC congregation and, after a final set of examinations, hopes to be ordained in June 2011.

Rev Zoltan Les, a minister of the Reformed Church in Transylvania in Romania, comes with five years’ experience of parish ministry in a mining town with high unemployment. His year of study at UTC will focus primarily on Pastoral Theology, as he undertakes further research for a dissertation on Contextual Therapy in Christian Counselling.

During the coming year, Zoltan will be involved with Garnerville Presbyterian Church, in East Belfast. At this stage, he’s not exactly sure what ‘comes next’ when he returns home to Transylvania next summer.

It is hoped that there will be opportunities during the next nine months for both Rózsa and Zoltan to make wider connections with the PCI family, and for our members to hear something about the life and witness of the Reformed Church in Hungary and Transylvania, and the challenges facing the Christian communities in both regions.