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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, JANUARY 11, 1985
Hungary was ruled by the Habsburgs, was a golden period in the
country's history. [ During Emperor Franz-Josef's reign--1848-
1916--Hungary was granted autonomy and ruled over much of eastern
Europe.] This wistful view was given semi-official approval this
month when the communist weekly Magyar Ifusag published an inter
view with a prominent historian, Dr. Peter Hanak. He attacked
the traditional communist view of the Habsburg empire as a vehi
cle of national oppression.
Whereas in most eastern European countries the Habsburgs are de
scribed in schools and official publications as "those cruel ty
rants who crushed the spirit of national freedom," Hungary has
increasingly viewed its imperial past in a more favourable light.
Hanak's remarks, in praise of the national "integration" and
"peaceful flourishing of different cultures under� ruler" dur
ing the Habsburg rule, struck a chord with many Hungarians who
are worried about the fate of their fellow countrymen who make up
the large Magyar minorities of Romania and Czechoslovakia. Hun
garians are increasingly hearing reports of "cultural genocide"
in Transylvania, the area now ruled by Romania which they regard
as the cradle of Magyar culture. They hear of Hungarians being
forced to change their names to the Romanian equivalents and of
the suppression of Hungarian poetry and prose••••
During the past year, � stream of books concerning 19th-century
Hungary has been published. Bookshops are filled with romanti
cally titled coffee-table books depicting the grand buildings and
cultural events of the days when Budapest was an elegant royal
capital.
The recent opening of the capital's newly-restored
opera house, a building which personifies this age, has helped to
concentrate Hungarians' minds on their past.
With statues and bridges named after the empresses of the Austro
Hungarian empire, and an annual changing of the guards in imperi
al uniforms, Hungary is careful not to neglect its imperial heri
tage. No more striking a symbol of this could be found than the
Hungarian royal crown, displayed after years of absence in the
capital's national museum.
Watched over by eight policemen,
visitors solemnly file past the crown, in a darkened room, as if
paying respect to a communist martyr rather than a relic of impe
rialism.
The "pull of the past" is going to be increasingly difficult for the Soviets
to deal with. It should be noted too, that there is a widespread belief
that the u.s.s.R.'s next leader will be Mikhail Gorbachev. The personable
53-year-old lawyer and agronomist "wowed them" on his recent visit to Lon
don. Tough but considered practical and not unquestionably wedded to ide
ology, Gorbachev just might be the individual necessary to enable the So
viet Union to accommodate itself to the realities of Yalta's fifth decade.
--Gene H. Hogberg, News Bureau