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Church buildings and renovations also serve to strengthen communities, said Árpád János Potápi, Minister of State for National Policy at the Prime Minister’s Office, in Tupá (Kistompa), Slovakia where he gave a speech at the consecration of the newly built Church of St. Francis of Assisi.
The construction of the Roman Catholic church in the village, where a third of the population is Hungarian, began in 2016, and was inaugurated over the weekend.
The church was built with a significant contribution of the local government and Hungarian archpriests, private and public donations, and a HUF 52.8 million (EUR 139,000) grant from the Hungarian State Secretariat for National Policy.
Árpád János Potápi said that the most important task of the Hungarian government in the past 12-13 years has been to strengthen communities in Hungary and the Carpathian Basin. He pointed out that this can be achieved if local communities set goals that can be supported and jointly implemented, and church renovations and buildings are one such goal, both strengthening the community.
He added that
years ago, in Tupá, a village with a mixed population, the community, both Hungarians and Slovaks, set the goal of building a new church.
The state secretary pointed out that since Hungarians and Slovaks live together in the village, their church, as well as their faith and culture, are common, as was their country in past centuries. “The Carpathian Basin is our common homeland, even if it is now divided by borders,” he concluded.
Via MTI, Featured image:Facebook/Potápi Árpád János