Homily on the Occasion of the Dedication of the Chapel of Our Lady of Hungary in the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington

Eminence, Fellow Priests, Representatives of the Political, Cultural and Social Life, Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

1. After the Holy Mass we will dedicate with great joy the new Chapel of Our Lady of Hungary, here, in the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception, National Shrine of the United States. Shortly after taking up my office, in 2004 I have visited the majority of the Hungarian catholic communities in the United States and Canada; here in Washington I saw that in this beautiful basilica a great number of national chapels represents those nations and communities whose faith and testimony contributed to the building of American Catholicism. I looked for the Hungarian chapel but did not find it. History and partly also today's life of these communities show however that through their faith and testimony the arriving Hungarians have been playing an important role in the local catholic community. I would like to thank therefore to Cardinal Wuerl, as local Archbishop and to Mons. Rossi, rector of the Shrine for their benevolent consent to creating the chapel. I would like to thank to and recognize the efforts of those Hungarians who contributed to the success of this initiative with their means. Grateful acknowledgments are due to the Hungarian Embassy and the Hungarian Catholic Bishops' Conference for treating this cause as their own. Our languages, traditions and community lives may be very different but our catholic faith is the same all over the world. The Church wants to speak to everyone so as to find the best way to one's heart. So it is not only about understanding or not the language of the Holy Mass or the homily but also about appreciating our own values in the community before God so as to be able to open our hearts also towards others.
Nowadays a new kind of Hungarian presence can be observed in the major cities of Western Europe and America. They come to work or to study in large numbers. Often with the intention to return to Hungary in a few years. And they frequently long for Hungarian speech and a Hungarian community. This can be a challenge and refreshment for those who have been living here for long, and a strengthening in faith and community life for the newcomers.

2. In today's holy mass we have heard the Gospel which is read on the feast of King Saint Stephen. The lesson from the New Testament especially enlightens the work of King Saint Stephen and what is most current in it for us now. (Ephesians, 4,17-24). We, have read in the letter to the Ephesians namely that we should not be like pagans any more. This was the great problem also in the age of Saint Stephen. It is not enough to formally accept Christianity, not enough to form an alliance with the west for political usefulness but we have to change humanly, we have to become Christians also in our way of thinking. And every other reason for which our country has been honoring the work of King Saint Stephen from year to year is worth respecting. Founding a state, organizing a country, laying the foundations of administration and the law are all great deeds. For us however, here and now the most important message is still, how our thinking and hearts have to change finally, so as not to live and think as pagans. There is an answer in the Letter to the Ephesians. Saint Paul lists there the characteristics of the pagans' behavior and world view and what should Christians be guided by. Summing it all up, he says "you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds". Elsewhere in the New Testament we read: do not live like "the others who do not have hope" ( 1 Thessalonians 4, 13 ). These are the two basic conditions under which people live if they have not reached Christ. They do not have any hope because they have confidence in human things; they try purely with human efforts to judge what may be good and useful in life. And again and again they face their limits and the fact that they cannot achieve, either as a person or a community, what they would consider good and important. Then they meet the difficulties originating from the lack of success, from failure; and then they do not know how to go on. And it is too easy to grow desperate, and be hopeless, that the life of an individual, a family or of a whole country makes no sense.
Why? Because those prospects which they have held that important seem now not being open. For example earthly well-being or the kind of progression which somebody may take for the greatest value.
The other very typical characteristic is that pagans live in the futility of their minds. If we do not meet Christ what will set things right in our inside, what will give us a standard? Because we may exist without faith and religion, or may believe m a mysterious phenomenon, may even respect the universe incomprehensible and
unknowable by our mind if we cannot reach the personal God loving us, we will see the value of things in a different way because we measure the significance of things according to the situations of everyday worldly life. But this life has an end, and the closing of the earthly life is a final mark for those who do not have faith. Thus these people compare all other things to the trifles of life. That is the measure of their love for the other people. That is the measure of the prospects of their own life. How often we hear for example: this or that work might be valuable in some time but of what use it will be for me? Or: even our grandchildren will not see the results of it; and so on. They live thus in futilities because these seem to be the most important which are available in their life, for them. For example as to comfort, material advantages, to making life more beautiful. But these things are weighing little if compared to Jesus and the perspective which opens up for believers. Because Christianity is not a pure natural religion. We are observing the world around us not only with our human minds and are drawing always new conclusions from generation to generation but we are the disciples of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. His teachings, his life, his death, and his resurrection are the essence of our faith. He has been a historic person who had a homeland, a nation, a mother tongue, a culture, and whose teachings and gospel have been preserved by the community of his disciples to this day.

3. Building a church or a chapel is not a commonplace enterprise. It expresses the faith of a community or even of a society. The church is a sign pointing to heaven. It is a sign of a community's ability to make even sacrifices for the honor of God and for the benefit of its own soul. Because every church reminds us that our lives are not in vain, that our works on earth and all our well-meant endeavors fit in the plan of God's love.That is why in God and in his love even human creating efforts may be of eternal value.
The decree of Saint Stephen on building churches was an inevitable consequence of accepting Christian faith. That is, to renew in our way of thinking and to finally abandon paganism which means: to really accept Jesus Christ as our Savior and to have hope in him from that moment. This is the hope that both individuals and communities can cling to, and this is which will never disappoint us. Because this hope is true not only of the life within these earthly boundaries but also beyond that, of the universe and of eternity. But if we believe in such a strange thing, then our way of thinking and our lives should be very special, too. Then the value of things will change, and then such acts and situations have to accompany us which are noticed by people. And they will say: how is that possible? That someone gives and helps without profiting from it, and is just so kind the day after tomorrow as if we have not insulted him/her? As if he/she did not have anything to settle up or get even. That is true because we, Christians have learned from Christ how to forgive, where the focus of our life is, and that we have to love the other people as ourselves.
Here, in the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception, in the Chapel of our Lady of Hungary we should think of the Virgin Mary as mother of all nations but especially of us she is Our Lady and Patron of Hungary. Let us pray for the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Hungarian saints for the Hungarians living in America and all over the world, and also for the whole American nation. May God give us that this chapel strengthened the community of faith and love between us.
Amen.