www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall How to Find a Church in Hungary

Hi, I am very new to this forum. Actually, this is my first.

Anyway, we are trying to locate the church our family attended in the late 1800's / early 1900's in Hungary. Is there a website that lists churches (even those that no longer exist) in Hungary? Also, my family MIGHT have lived in Munkacs (Munkacheve, Ukraine - was Hungary at the time) so if you have information for that it would be most appreciated as well...

If you have any information, please post it here. Thank you very much. You help is genuinely appreciated.

Christina

Almasi,

What is the name of the village? The Church of Latter Day Saints have microfilm copies of church records from the former Austria-Hungary Counties that you can obtain to look at their LDS library near your town. I know many of my fellow genealogists have great success with their microfilm records.

Ungcsertezs

Christina:

Glory to Jesus Christ!

If you know the name of the village, and if it is in present-day Hungary, I can give you find the name of the church and the current pastor.

In Christ,
Theophilos

Dear Christina,

It seems that you and your family are/and were Greek-Catholics (nobody in Hungary would identify with "Byzantine Catholic"). That makes it somewhat easier.

Start digging through whatever documents - if any - you or your family still have that the "old ones" may have brought with them from Europe. If they left "Hungary" before or during World War I, the place which they left may now be part of Ukraine, Slovakia, or Romania. While you're at it, check the records in the USA - where did they enter the US, what identification did they present, etc. What boat did they arrive on? This all sounds like boring scut work, but you'll be amazed at what gems of information you can turn up.

Where did these people get married, and did anyone get married in the US on the strength of a baptismal certificate brought from Europe? Start checking the American parish records - and don't be surprised to find lacunae in the record books. But in theory the bride and the groom should each have presented baptismal certificates from the parish(es) where they were baptized - and the original parish(es) should have been notified of the wedding. Sometimes it even happened.

Are there any letters from anyone in the "Old Country" to relatives in America? Even if you can't read the letters, people who can read the relevant language(s) can be found.

I've only scratched the surface, but this should keep you busy for a while. Beware of the vocabulary - a priest friend in an old Pennsylvania Greek-Catholic parish was once visited by some people from Savannah or some such place, seeking information on their ancestors. They had failed elsewhere; my friend nearly fell off his chair when his visitors mentioned that they "had even visited the village in Greece, but no one there knew anything about their family". Since Greek-Catholics in old Pennsylvania mining towns are emphatically NOT ethnic Greeks, it's not surprising that visiting a village in Hellas would not produce any useful information!

But by the same token, there was an episode a few decades ago - in Hungary, of all places. A couple of "Byzantine Catholic" seminarians visiting Hungary were stopped by the police for some minor traffic violation. When asked to explain who they were and why they were in Hungary the seminarians claimed to be Americans of Byzantine extraction! This caused the police to hold them for several days while referring the matter to Budapest inquiring what on earth "Byzantine extraction" could possibly mean. Eventually, the confusion was unscrambled, but you do not want the same thing to happen to you.

Do you have the name of a parish church in the Old Country? Many parishes share patron saints, naturally, but that can still help to narrow things down a bit.

What linguistic memory did your elders bring with them? What was their preferred language? That might tell you something.

Each Greek-Catholic diocese regularly published a directory, called in Latin a "Schematismus", which will at least tell us what parishes were functioning at the relevant time. Tracking these books down can be a bit difficult (the best collection of them is under lock and key at the Eparchy of Passaic's Heritage Museum, which seems to have been closed since Bishop Michael retired), but can be chased down by looking in the right places.

What, by the way, is your own linguistic situation? This may lead you to make inquiries in places and among people where English cannot be taken for granted.

Have fun!

Fr. Serge

I know I have asked this before with no reply, but where on earth did the use of this term "Byzantine Catholic" come from.
It seems to be an American terminology.
Why on earth don't you Americans go back to using "Greek Catholic"? It is used in the "old country" etc.
Even the Orthodox use "Greek", for example, the Ukrainian Greek Orthodox Church of Canada.
The Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of Canada, not Byzantine Orthodox.
In Russia, up to 1900, the Orthodox faith was referred to in contemprary writing as the "Greek" faith. The early churches in North America were the Russian Greek Orthodox Church.

Why do Americans want to use a confusing term like "Byzantine"?

Slava Isusu Khrestu

We were at one time called "Ukrainian Greek Orthodox Church of Canada." but officially and formally are known as "Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Canada". The term "Greek" was dropped.

Z Bohom
Kolya

I don't have a poll or a citation to offer but I believe the thinking was at one point that the use of the term "Greek" caused people to think we were ethnic Greeks from Greece.

Well Fr. Serge pointed out above, that use of the term "Byzantine" didn't help at all.

Interesting. But the world is now a smaller place. The Eastern
Catholic churches is Europe use the term "Greek" as in Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church etc.
For consistency, wouldn't it be better for Americans to use the terminology in use throughout history and consistently in the motherland?
Just a thought on my part.

Welcome, Christina !

-- John

It probably would be better, you have a valid point.

And Father Serge was right.

I was only offering reason why the change was made, not how effective or sensible it was.

I self-identify as a "Greek Catholic". People prone to believe I am an ethnic Greek* who is a Roman Catholic, are just as likely to be confused by "Byzantine" in different ways for different reasons.

-Simple, a Greek Catholic

* For the record, I'd be very happy to be an ethnic Greek with a YaYa cooking up a storm of Greek cuisine... No complaints there, were it the case! (I'd also tan rather than burn in the sun...sigh) As Providence would have it, no such luck.

The move from the term "Greek Catholic" to the current "Byzantine Catholic" came in the postwar years as the hierarchy began distancing the church from its ethnic foundation in the hope of becoming a vigorous American church, stressing the connection to its ancient roots Constantinople, rather than its more recent roots among the Ruyns the Carpathians.

It accompanied the adoption of the Gregorian calendar and the spread of English in the liturgy.

One of the explanations for the change was the confusion non-Greek Catholics had with the term "Greek," since it's also the name of an existing ethnic identity (and there are very few Greek Catholics of Greek ethnicity.)

--tim

Thank you to everyone for your replies.

My family lived in Munkacs, Hungary - which is now Mukachevo, Ukraine. There is also mention on one record of a Davidfalva (?).

We believe that my great-grandparents, Kusnyir Janos and Almasy Sofia, were married there but we do not know for sure. I do have a baptismal certificate for my grandmother from Philadelphia, USA but it only states her parents names, witnesses, etc. It was from Holy Ghost Byzantine Catholic Church in 1913.

I made a small website about my search if anyone is interested...
http://thoughtsfromnj.tripod.com/almasy

Thank you,
Christina

Christina,

What year did your PraDido (Great-Grandfather) John emigrate to America? My Dido also made passage on the Carpathia. He set sail from Treste (near Fiume) in November of 1908. Four years later that was the ship that answered the Titanic's distress call and did manage to rescue some survivors.

Have you found any records that mention the village of Zavidovo (Bereg County east of Mukachevo) yet?

Ungcsertezs

Yes, I have found a document that mentions Zavidovo. It is my understanding that Davidfalva is the same as Zavidovo. Is this correct?

My great grandfather sailed to USA from Fiume in the end of November 1908 on the Carpathia. Arrived in New York City beginning of December 1908.

Is there a specific reason you ask? I ask this because I notice you are from Pennsylvania, which is where the family settled.

Let me know.
Christina

Christina,

I thought they might have been on the same Carpathia voyage. Go to the Ellis Island site and you can search your relatives' names. Most of the info is correct. They will show you the ship's Manifest lists and even show a photo of the Carpathia.
I hope you can find more information. Good luck!

Ungcsertezs