Index – Homeland – The pastor who criticized Zoltán Balog cannot continue his work because of his preaching in February

It’s not a punishment, it’s a consequence – declared Zoltán Balog, the bishop of the Reformed Church District of Dunamellek, in response to Reformed pastor László Thoma, according to a letter addressed to his congregation, which was reported by RTL Híradó.

As we wrote, in his sermon on February 18, the leading pastor of the Reformed Church in Gazdagrét, in response to the newly erupted pardon scandal, stated that “politics cannot be so involved in the operation of God’s people”, and he also made specific comments on the advice given to the former head of state Katalin Novák’s pardon decision About Zoltán Balog.

“If he really realizes the gravity of his actions and the divisiveness of his role, he would help the community of our church the most if he would realize how much he is harming and resign from all his leadership positions,” the pastor declared in the church on February 18. After that, at the beginning of July, he received a notification from the church district that from September he could not continue his work at the Faculty of Religion of the Reformed University, where he had worked for 11 years – previously as a teacher, and in the last academic year as an assistant professor, part-time.

He had a fixed-term contract until August 31 this year, which was not extended. According to RTL’s information, it is because the board of the church district wrote an e-mail that they do not support this. The pastor wrote a letter to his followers about what happened, in which he also reports that he spoke personally with the presidency, including Bishop Zoltán Balog.

It was said here that the decision was a consequence of my preaching in February, but I should not take it as a punishment

– he wrote in his letter, adding that “it hurts and I think it’s unfair, but I put it before God and accepted it from his hand.”

“It’s actually a purge, but I’m not at all surprised by the fact of this purge, that’s pretty much how it goes,” said presbyter Levente Kónya. Since February, many people have asked Zoltán Balog to resign from the bishopric, but to no avail. “I don’t understand why he is so attached to the episcopal seat, when he himself can see that this whole case and his person cast a particularly bad light on the church,” he declared.

RTL sought out pastor László Thoma, but he did not want to comment, and the Reformed Church wrote that the decision was made by the presidency of the Reformed Church District of Dunamellek, which they only learned about afterwards.

This is not the first such case, the church parted ways with former cantor Anikó Vargha because he criticized Zoltán Balog.

As we reported, at the beginning of February, Zoltán Balog explained his involvement in the grace scandal during an hours-long hearing at the headquarters of the Synod of the Hungarian Reformed Church. As a result of the scandal that rocked the entire country, head of state Katalin Novák resigned, and Judit Varga also announced her retirement from public life.

Although Zoltán Balog resigned from his position as pastor of the synod, he did not resign from his position as bishop. In this article, we also presented what kind of damage recovery work he started behind the scenes.