Abstract

St. Elizabeth's of Hungary was formed in 1892. The parish acted as not only a place for the members of the congregation to seek spiritual guidance, but also acted a place for people to socialize. St. Elizabeth's of Hungary also had a school that opened in the 1920s, but was eventually closed in 1961.

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Interviewee

Antal, Andras (interviewee); Purgert, Robert (interviewee)

Interviewer

Sezemsky, Meg

Project

Sacred Landmarks

Date

2011

Document Type

Oral History

Duration

62 minutes

Transcript

Meg Sezemsky [00:00:00] Just tell me your name.

Robert Purgert [00:00:01] I’m Bob Purgert.

Andras Antal [00:00:04] Father Andras Antal.

Meg Sezemsky [00:00:06] Thank you. And we’re here at St. Elizabeth’s Church.

Robert Purgert [00:00:11] They used to use St. Elizabeth of Hungary.

Meg Sezemsky [00:00:13] Of Hungary. Okay, so what are we looking at?

Robert Purgert [00:00:17] Well, these- We have our own museum. And this is somewhat of the artifacts of the parish. You know, as I say, it was formed in 1892. The history of why it was formed was prior to that is that the bishop had a church, St. Ladislas, which was on a block just behind us at 90th and Holton, which was to serve the Slovak and Hungarian people together. And the Slovak people are Slavic, the Hungarian are Magyar. And they found that they wasn’t necessarily the best putting together as possible. So the Bishop of Cleveland asked the Primate of Hungary if he could send a priest to form a Hungarian parish here in Cleveland. And so Father Boehm came here in 1892, and he formed the first Roman Catholic Hungarian church in both north and South America, from my understanding, right here in Cleveland, Ohio. And he formed the church in September of 1892 or December was the founding of the church. December for church was built in. So in less than a year. The parish was formed in the end of 1892. And then the first building was actually constructed on this site by the end of 1893.

Andras Antal [00:01:28] The parish was founded 1892 through- In December.

Robert Purgert [00:01:32] December of 1892. And then the church building that was here was actually after this was built, they built the hall, which is on the other side of the priest house, so that they could move mass from here to the hall during the years that they built this building building. And they started this one in what, in 1917, maybe when they first started it, or 1918. But the First World War in Iraq, 1917.

Andras Antal [00:01:55] And they finished- And it was- The second church was consecrated in 1922, February 22nd.

Robert Purgert [00:02:05] And that’s the church building that you’re in today. So it has a long history as a parish. And the people that have come here, you know, my family came here in the late 1890s. And there’s a lot of continuity through the years of people who came here. It’s an ethnic parish rather than a territorial. Territorial are more like what you and I are probably familiar with as kids. You have a neighborhood, and that’s the parish that you go to where this has more of a function. And so the community is, though this was primarily a Hungarian and Slovak community back 100 years ago is that as time has gone on, the Hungarian people from all over the city come back here. And then with the recent closing of some of the other parishes is that this is the last of the Hungarian parishes in the diocese, in fact, in northern Ohio, from Youngstown to Lorain and South. So Father has kind of a pretty big job of taking care of a lot of the elderly, too. Because one thing that is interesting is that a lot of people who learn English as a second language in their old age, so sometimes when they go to nursing homes and things, they lose their English and they go back and they revert to the language of their youth, the mother language. So it’s very common that that happens. So for a lot of the people to receive the sacraments and things they like to come to here for many of the main doings. And then, of course, in their elderly times, they have Father for confession and last sacraments. Where we’re standing is in the basement of the church. And one of the things that we did is even though there is a Hungarian Heritage Society in Cleveland, they have a nice museum downtown, we have a parish museum. And this is just kind of dedicated to kind of the history of our parish. And we have a lot of memorabilia here from the various organizations and the people throughout the history of the parish.

Meg Sezemsky [00:03:53] What are these medals over here?

Robert Purgert [00:03:56] These are from the different fraternal organizations. The St. Anne, Holy Mary and. I don’t know what Father has to read. This is the Arpat House, St. Elizabeth organization. So there are various fraternal organizations and also the school.

Andras Antal [00:04:17] This parish had a very, very large schoo, more than 1300 kids learned here in Delco.

Meg Sezemsky [00:04:32] Could you explain to me what a fraternal organization is?

Robert Purgert [00:04:36] Well, these are organizations that are around usually a theme. Like, we had a rosary and altar society that primarily they took care of all of the vestments and they took care of all of the altar cloths to sew them and do those kinds of things. And then the ladies, as time went on like now we have an alumni association, which is. Father mentioned a lot of the people who went to school here subsequent, they wanted to still stay together even though the school closed in the early 1960s as kind of like an association, that they have a common bond and that’s the reason that they come together and they do some parish activities, some doings, and then they donate the money for various things that might need to be done here for the kitchen or other things that the parish might need. Here’s some of the classes.

Meg Sezemsky [00:05:29] Could you describe to me the kind of dress?

Robert Purgert [00:05:33] Yes.

Meg Sezemsky [00:05:33] What years are these pictures?

Robert Purgert [00:05:34] Well, what those pictures are each year in the Fall Festival, it’s called the Fall Festival. And one of the things that they taught all of us as kids is kind of, again, a connection to your heritage is folk dancing. And most Eastern European people have folk dances that are really kind of emblematic of those people. And in our parish, we have an annual event that’s called the Fall Festival in September generally. And it’s to really commemorate the harvest at the end of the growing season. And most of the people, interestingly, when you look at the history of our parish, is that the first people that came over in the late 1800s were really peasants. They were farmers, or they were peasant type people looking for work in the industrial plants here in the middle section of the United States. And then subsequent to that, we had two other big waves of immigrants, maybe three now after the Second World War, and then in 1956 after the revolution, and then recently after the fall of communism. And the second group that came were more of the people that were more of the intelligentsia, people who maybe were a little bit more of means that because of Communism, had to leave their homeland where, like what my grandparents, they came because of economic needs, strictly economic need. Some of the others that came in the next waves might have been a little bit more political. The new wave that’s come in the last 20 years are young families, mainly from a part of Romania that was really Hungry until 75 years ago. And the one treaty after the First World War dismembered Hungary and took about two thirds of her land and half of her people and put them in other new countries and new organizations, places like Czechoslovakia and new countries that were formed, which left a lot of Hungarians kind of disconnected from Hungary. It also did something for a lot of the people that were here. When they studied the migrations of a lot of Eastern Europeans and Southern Europeans, they came to America to work, thinking that they were going to go home in a little while. Well after the end of the First World War, when Hungary was kind of dismembered. Like where my family came from is now Slovakia. It was like, I’m a foreigner here. I’ll be a foreigner if I go home. So they stayed, and for all of us, we’re glad they did. But what we do do once a year, besides some of the other doings that are here, is we hold an annual Fall festival. And the people dress in the native costumes, our folk costumes from there, and particularly even of our young kids and now the grandkids and the generations down. We want them to learn at least one or two folk dances of our heritage. So the kids will dress up as well now, even the grandkids and things like that in the Hungarian outfits. Now it’s interesting, the ethnic outfits of Hungary is that depending on what region you’re from, the outfit could change a little bit. Right now, the people from the Seika area, they wear more black pants with.

Andras Antal [00:08:30] An off white and red Transylvania, part of Romania now. But then there are Hungarians that are.

Robert Purgert [00:08:37] There and where we knew more, I think what they called the national dress, which was the white dress with the red vest. And then for the boys, we would have a vest, black pants and a sash. I almost thought that was my brother.

Meg Sezemsky [00:08:50] What are the decorations? Are they like ribbons or what are the decorations?

Robert Purgert [00:08:53] Yeah, the colors of Hungary are red, white and green on their flag. It’s a tricolor flag flag that looks just like that, that you see up there. The crest that is in the middle, that is the full crest and it has the angels on both sides. One of the things about Hungary is that probably more so than many of the countries other than maybe Poland in Europe, is that it’s very, very intertwined with the faith, is that the founder of Hungary was Saint Stephen in the year 1000 or 896 when Hungarians came. And then in 997 or the year 1000, the kingdom was formed and Saint Stephen had the option of getting his crown from either the Pope, the Holy Roman Emperor or the head of the Byzantine Church. And he took from the Rome from the Church. So there was a real close alignment between the faith and the country of Hungary. And in fact, when he died, his son had been killed in a hunting accident. So on his deathbed, he left the crown, the crown of St. Stephen to Mary. And they call the nickname of Hungary is Ragnum Marianum, Mary’s land. And so it’s actually Mary’s crowned. It’s her crown, it’s her country. And you rule in the name of the crown because that’s Mary’s crown. And then there’s some interesting things in the history is that the way that the primate used to work is that when there was the kings, and they were kind of democratic in kings, because the families would die out and then the nobles would elect the king in the family and all this stuff, until the Habsburgs came along. But the primate’s job was, because this was Mary’s crown that they were really ruling in her name is that if they did a little bit off color of what the Church might consider to be Right. He had an obligation to tell them that this is not what you should be doing, because this is Mary’s crown. So when they study the history too, it’s interesting, because you don’t rule in the name of the king, you rule in the name of the crown. And it’s Mary’s crown.

Andras Antal [00:10:48] We have a very nice window.

Robert Purgert [00:10:50] Window or stained glass window that’ll show you.

Andras Antal [00:10:53] St. Stephen offered the country, the people, to the Blessed Virgin Mary with her crown.

Robert Purgert [00:11:03] And that also caused some consternation, because later we were the only country that had, as our primate would have the title in the past, of the Prince Primate. Because if there was no king, then the person who would rule the country while they were waiting for a king was the Primate of the Church. And that was why they hated Mindszenty so much. The people after the Second World War, the Communists. Is that because he had probably a legitimate right to say, if this government is coming apart, he would be the head of it. So they really focused on him and did some nasty things, as you know, they put him in prison for a number of years. When the revolution came, they got him out of prison. When the revolution was collapsing, he took refuge in the American Embassy, where he lived until, I think, 1970 or so, because to come out, he would have been arrested. And finally they negotiated a peace that he could at least leave the country. And in fact, he was here two times.

Andras Antal [00:11:54] Yes, Cardinal Mindszenty in North America.

Robert Purgert [00:11:56] In North America. And getting back to these pictures. These are the kids and the various organizations that were at the school.

Meg Sezemsky [00:12:03] School.

Robert Purgert [00:12:04] One of the things that happened with the generation of my mom was that learning to speak, read and write Hungarian fluently was not so important. The big thing was to assimilate the kids into American, into America. So like my mom, she could hear Hungarian, understand it, but to speak it is too hard. I understand a few words, but, you know, we just kind of lost it, unfortunately. Now, of course, we realize that the kids at the. That’s when your mind is most fertile to learn another language. We should really teach them both languages that are there. But I always like to tell the joke, not to joke the story about on the streets, you were American. In your house, they spoke Hungarian. Here at church, your doings, you know, you were allowed to be whatever you were. But, you know, America is this interesting place that in the public areas and things, to really get ahead in your job or whatever, you have to learn the language, the customs. And that’s what differentiates us so much so than a lot of parts of Europe today is that the people who come here come for economic advantage. And the way that you do that is to become like the place that you’re at. And in a lot of places of Europe, in fact, they’re going through those throes right now. People come for political purposes, so they come to set up a mini whatever it is that they just left. And so the assimilation doesn’t take place in America. We could take tell you right now with a lot of the kids that have come over, like in the last 20 years, first few years, two years after they come, the young families, they’re going to work here until they get their citizenship, then they’re going to go home. That’s the first two years. By the third and the fourth year, they go home and they kind of. They’re not sure. After five years, they realize they become American. They just. They feel so different than what’s at home. And there’s just something about this Americanism. It’s just kind of slowly, but it just takes you over. You become American, your thinking becomes American, Father can attest to it. It just happens in time, you really become everybody who’s here. Unless you try to stop it, you just automatically become an American. It’s a unique place, the only place in the world that’s like that. So for our young families that are here, and I say this about their kids, the ones that came here as real, their kids are now graduating, going to high school and college, that I have kids too. You couldn’t tell them apart. I mean, they’re as American as they. You couldn’t tell other than that they can speak Hungarian and amongst themselves they can speak it. You’d walk, you’d run into them in a coffee shop or something, you wouldn’t know. You’d figure they were here for three generations, five generations. It just happens. It’s an amazing thing about our country. It’s also amazing about our country that places like this, because we have a lot of elderly that who came that were really were kind of isolated away and they didn’t need to become so active in the bigger community. So their language skills were somewhat limited. And for them, this has become a real nice nucleus. And it also did for the new folks that came over who didn’t learn English yet, is that this became kind of a place that you came to. And that’s how we found a lot of them jobs. There’s a support network that’s here and. And I’m not saying other parishes don’t have what you find here. But this is kind of unique is that really when these folks, when they got freed from communism and they were coming to America, they looked for a parish that. Because it’s where they wanted to worship. And then they found out that this is where the support structure was too. So they come back and it’s kind of a nice place that you could speak the language, you could feel. Ask somebody who might have been here for one or two more years. Where do you go for a driver’s license to have somebody. Do they have the test? Is it written in Hungarian? Is it, you know, can I take it in Hungarian? I mean, all of these kinds of things. The support network is kind of here to help each other. But you can see just like what our grandparents, within a few years, they’re now helping the next crew that’s coming in. And their kids, they’re as American as they just. You become American. So anyhow, that’s kind of the story. And then the schools, it closed in 1961, I think was our last class or ’65 was the last class. Yeah, we got very small. But these are some of the pictures we had. And we’ll give you a book that shows it. We had, besides the schools, the organizations that were here, you know, like the bowling leagues and basketball. Sports, Sports. We had our own teams and things like that. So was a full fledged operating parish. So basketball. Basketball, yeah, they were big at basketball and bowling. They liked the bowl too. And they did plays here in the hall next door. So it was. And movies.

Meg Sezemsky [00:16:38] This is a great picture. Could you tell me this is like a vaudeville picture?

Robert Purgert [00:16:42] Yeah, it was a vaudeville and the rhythmic rangers. This even when they were doing, when it was not considered as offensive as today, you know, little black face and things like that. But yeah, they actually did plays. We did plays. They had movies. Because again, this became the nucleus of the social. Not only the spiritual, but the social well being of the people. And you know, I think that’s where again too I find this with our. My, even my kids that this isn’t just a place that you come and punch your hour on Sunday. I mean, this is really a community. I mean, you know, we have our Christmas parties here amongst all the people and it becomes the nucleus of a lot of social activity. Not like back in those days where even your dances were here and movies and those kinds of things, but it still really is for many of our people. This is where the community starts. It’s here. Well, you think about it for a lot of these folks, not like today, when you came here, you might get home once in a lifetime. So you really kind of picked up new family here. And we have a lot of people who are married through different cousins that my- Not that they married cousins, but I have some cousins who married their cousins that are over there. So you find out that you somehow or another are related more every time you kind of probe beneath the surface and things. Here’s some more of the historic posters. And we have a little history about him as well too, is that he formed the parish, then he left for a few years, then he came back. And then we really had what, four pastors now, Father?

Andras Antal [00:18:19] Four or five with me. Six.

Robert Purgert [00:18:22] You’re six.

Andras Antal [00:18:24] Three here, three there. Yeah. We could check it up from outside.

Robert Purgert [00:18:29] So for 100 and some years, 120 years, six pastors is not.

Andras Antal [00:18:33] Between 1893 and 1918, this was the first building, the first church building.

Meg Sezemsky [00:18:41] And that was on a different site?

Robert Purgert [00:18:42] No, it was right here. So that was it torn down? Yeah. They had to take this one down. What? That’s what I say. They built the hall so they could move the mass over to the hall. This would be where the priest house is. Then the hall would be over there. Then they took this down and put this one in its place.

Meg Sezemsky [00:18:57] Okay. Did they reuse any part of that building for the new building?

Robert Purgert [00:19:03] Probably some of the foundation. The bench we didn’t use the. We have some of the old benches here. They put new benches.

Andras Antal [00:19:09] Yeah, we have some. Four benches up or something. But not too many things.

Robert Purgert [00:19:16] You know, those days the idea of saving and the reusing was not as strong as today.

Meg Sezemsky [00:19:21] What is this?

Robert Purgert [00:19:21] That’s our church. You’ll see upstairs.

Andras Antal [00:19:25] This is the second building etching on the interior.

Robert Purgert [00:19:27] Yeah, the one that’s upstairs now. And then. This is Monsignor Tanos. He was here for a long time. How many years was He, Pastor, Father?

Andras Antal [00:19:41] 43.

Robert Purgert [00:19:42] 43. Oh, look, the kids with violins. Violin’s a big instrument in Hungarian music. I wonder who this young priest is. I wonder who this young guy is.

Meg Sezemsky [00:20:13] That’s you.

Robert Purgert [00:20:14] I was going to make a joke. I said, I wonder who this young priest is. And then I see this guy with black hair. Oh, this is at St Margaret’s.

Andras Antal [00:20:33] First period from 9 to 1907. And after that he came back. When he died, he went to Buffalo and built a Church in St. Louis. Reverend Doula. Sepesi Julius.

Meg Sezemsky [00:20:49] Okay.

Andras Antal [00:20:49] Jul- In Calgary. Yeah. Between 1907 and 1922.

Robert Purgert [00:20:59] She’s going to probably want a couple of these books and we should probably give her some Christmas cards. You think we should give her a plate, Father?

Andras Antal [00:21:05] Yeah.

Robert Purgert [00:21:05] Okay.

Andras Antal [00:21:06] Yeah. I don’t know if you. If you want that. Have a lot.

Meg Sezemsky [00:21:13] Okay. Yes. And can I hit it with my things.

Robert Purgert [00:21:30] Until the end of the First World War? And then this is what they. This is what’s Hungary today. So a lot of the people, like my family, came from up in this region right here.

Meg Sezemsky [00:21:41] Does that have a name, that region? Southern Slovakia.

Robert Purgert [00:21:47] Yeah. The Slovaks might call it Slovakia. We call it Northern Hungary. Yeah. These people call it Romania. We call that Transylvania. It’s Hungary, you know, so. Yeah. So this. But this is where a lot of the folks. Father, you’re from St. George. You’re from right over here on the edge.

Andras Antal [00:22:04] Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it is.

Meg Sezemsky [00:22:05] And that’s part of Romania now.

Andras Antal [00:22:07] Yeah, part of Romania.

Robert Purgert [00:22:08] Yeah.

Andras Antal [00:22:09] Now Transylvania. But parts to Romania now. Bigger than Hungary.

Robert Purgert [00:22:15] Yeah. Yeah. The part that got ceded to Romania is actually more land than what’s left now.

Meg Sezemsky [00:22:20] Can you tell me what makes someone Hungarian? Like what?

Robert Purgert [00:22:24] Well, it’s really the Hungarian people. It’s kind of interesting when you think about. In Europe, we think of things racially, like black, white, Asian or whatever. And in Europe, you’re more of- It’s your background. Slavic.

Andras Antal [00:22:36] Slavic people.

Robert Purgert [00:22:37] Slavic people, yeah. People are Hungarian. German.

Andras Antal [00:22:41] Yeah. Slovaks, Romanians, Ukrainians. Part this is Ukrainian, but also Hungarian people. And the part of Serbia and Croatia and Slovenia and Italy.

Meg Sezemsky [00:22:55] Are there certain characteristics that make someone Hungarian?

Robert Purgert [00:22:58] Well, they’ve done a lot of study, unfortunately, or fortunately, the Hungarians, and even starting back with Attila, is that his thinking was, is that you could become Hungarian. But there were certain things that you had to be. One was you had to learn the language. Second of all, you had to learn the folk dances. I read a book about that. You had to become Hungarian. Then you were Hungarian. So there are, like, you know, blond hair. There aren’t really distinguishing characteristics. The story is that the ancient Huns that came, Attila, now Tilla, is still a very common name in Hungary. It’s a very popular name. But he was the first waves. But then later, really, when the real migration started in 896, the people were from the East. There’s a lot of suspicious. They’re not exactly sure exactly where the Hungarian people came from. It’s in the Central Asia, Central Russia, and maybe near Mongolia, maybe north of Mongolia or something. The language is unique. In fact, the only people that speak the language similar to us. There is a place there, back in the middle of Russia, and the Finns. And the Finns and the Hungarian are related because of this common ancestry. And the language is similar. And usually the rhythm of the language. And we always tell the story about Bala Shiva was in Budapest. He speaks Hungarian very well. He said, I heard Hungarian behind me. And he said, but I couldn’t figure out what these guys are saying. He turned around here. They were Finnish soldiers. I4 so the rhythm of the language is the same, but the words are different. And they’re more different than even like if we hear the rhythm of the language of English or Indians who speak English, the rhythm’s not the same. Americans have its own way of kind of saying things. When you travel around, you hear, well, their rhythm is the same as ours too. But our ancestry then would come from that part of central Russia. And there’s some characteristics. One of the characteristics that you’ll find in real Hungarian people, they’ll see is that some of the eyes look almond shaped, almost a little bit oriental, a little bit darker complected. You’ll also find some of the customs. Like the proper Hungarian is you say your last name first, first name last. So when you meet somebody, their name is Toth. Robert, not Robert Toth. Now you’ll see as more and more Americanization and business goes there, they’re flipping them. But proper way to do that is it is backwards, which is more of an Asian type type thing. The other people that live around the Hungarian people are Slavic, you know, and the Slovaks, the Czechs, the Poles in the south, the slave Serbians, Croatians, Slovenians. Yeah, they’re Slavic. And then you have the German people. One time when I was there, I was in Romania and they said, well, we’re going to go see a German village. They said, oh, they moved here, you know, recently. And they said, yeah, 300 years ago. I said, well, how is it still a German village? It is. They speak German in that village and they. That’s. And they primarily marry within their own groups and things like that. So that’s how you become kind of like them. Now today we a lot of times look at the address and we assume that’s the nationality. But that’s not really how the Europeans kind of think of themselves. They think it’s a little bit more genetically based. So for Hungarian people, and that was one of the problems that happened when we were with St. Ladislas is the language, you know, Polish can understand Slovak, understand Czech and even Russian, because they’re Slavic. Hungarian is by itself. It’s totally by itself. And as they say, the Rhythm of the language. It’s almost always the accents on the first syllable. It’s just really an interesting language all the way around. And there’s a name for it. The word grows. The word keeps on adding onto it to mean something. So I always laugh. On the feast of St. John the Baptist, I remember saying the father says, Father, this word is like 20 some characters long. You know, it’s one word, but that’s the feast of St. John the Baptist. So the words grow and they’re very. If you don’t understand it, you could pick them out. But it’s a unique type, type language. So what happens in these places like Romania is that. And even somewhat in Slovakia, everybody was the club, whoever’s on top. Then if you not on top, you think that they’re discriminating against you. So for a long time the Slovaks thought the Hungarians were discriminating. Now it’s flipped the other way. Now in Romania, when the communists were there and stuff, they were masters at always trying to put a wedge between the people to keep them angry at each other instead of where it should been, at the government. So they would propagate the myth, oh, we’re all one big happy family. But they were treated. The Hungarians were second class citizens when it came to places like Romania. So you know, you say, well, what is it that makes you a Hungarian? Well, I guess if you lived there, they would say, well, you lived in a Hungarian village, you have a Hungarian name, you speak Hungarian and you become Hungarian. But we talked about that one on one trip is that we don’t all have blonde hair or there’s no distinguishing characteristic of Hungarian people.

Meg Sezemsky [00:28:03] And now with genetic testing we can find out so much more about like further back.

Robert Purgert [00:28:09] You’re right. Who was what? I always loved the story that we were in Europe one time on a bus and the guy was there with his wife and they were talking, driving by all the castles about all the kings and royal families and who’s related to who. And the husband said to the wife, well, now that we’re in Hungary, maybe we’ll find out that you’re a royal family. And she said, oh no. My grandfather explained to me how it really worked. The royal families didn’t need to come to America. Only the desperate poor people like him came to America. And it’s true, you know, I guess we all want to find out what’s their name and who are we related to. The reality is most of us are here is because I actually was to the census bureau In Hungary, in Budapest. And the guy said to me, says, well, we’ll go look in the books. Very nice. They actually say on the [?], you go in and go to the third door, knock on the guy’s vision. Very nice guy. He says, well, when did your family go to America? He says, the late 1800s. I said, yeah. He says, the chances of you being in the book are very small because they didn’t list the peasants. And he was right. It’s not there now. If you were a royal family, you owned property, then your name would be in the book. But he said the chances of most Americans to find anybody, it’s pretty slim because that’s not who went. And look what we did here in a hundred years. I mean, we have kids and grandkids in college and stuff, stuff like that. I mean, this is truly an amazing place. I travel a lot, I’ll tell you that. It’s nothing. I love going to see things in Europe and Hungary, but every time I come home, I’m just so thankful that they put my grandfather on that boat. This is an amazing place. I see it for our kids especially. No one anywhere in the world thinks like American kids. This is our future anyhow. Really very, very important person to Hungarian people.

Meg Sezemsky [00:29:52] Did you say his name?

Robert Purgert [00:29:55] Cardinal. Yeah. Cardinal Mindszenty. Joseph Mindszenty. Interesting story about him is that he was pushed back at the Nazis when they came, and he also did to the Russians when he was there. The one story is when they came to arrest him one time when they were dragging him down the street and the people came out, is that he wound up blessing them. So they realized that he was a pretty clever guy of how he could. Knew how to use the system. In the end, though, what they did do is they threw him in prison, they tortured him, and they drugged him into a false confession of treason, and then they threw him into prison on a life sentence.

Meg Sezemsky [00:30:32] This is the Communist.

Robert Purgert [00:30:33] The Communist. And then fortunately, when the revolution came, he was released. But when he saw that the revolution was crumbling, he ran into the American Embassy. And there’s still a plaque on the wall of the American Embassy who kept him there for, I think, until like 1970 or 71, when they negotiated that he could leave the country. So he’s pretty much been a. As I grew up and stuff, he was really an icon of those who stood up against the oppressive system of communism and what it did there, which was of their very nasty system. So very oppressive. So anyhow, he was here to America a few times to our parishes Cleveland was for many, many years was the Hungary’s second largest city. And that was true. Now Debrecen is that after Budapest there were more Hungarians that lived here than anywhere else.

Meg Sezemsky [00:31:27] Could you tell me this church that we see a picture of, where is that from? Is that the cardinal?

Robert Purgert [00:31:33] It’s not Esterdam. I don’t know where that is Father, do you? Andras Antal [00:31:36] I don’t know. It is from Hungry. Oh, this is in Austria. I know. He. It was he, he died.

Robert Purgert [00:31:49] Oh, where they exiled him to. Yeah.

Andras Antal [00:31:51] How we see it, it’s a big, big base in Austria.

Robert Purgert [00:31:58] Yeah. Because after they secured his release from the embassy, he went to Austria. Though they have reburied him in the basement of the big basilica in Estrogonom, which is where the, the Catholic Church, the Primate is and which is just like north of Budapest.

Andras Antal [00:32:15] Yeah. Because Vincenti died in. In Vienna, in Austria. And this is in, I don’t know, in Graz. Not close to Graz, but not in Graz.

Meg Sezemsky [00:32:28] Reminds me of Salzburg.

Robert Purgert [00:32:30] It does, doesn’t it? Salzburg’s a beautiful city, isn’t it? I love that city. Oh, here’s the Pope, John Paul, when he was at Mindszenty’s grave.

Meg Sezemsky [00:32:46] And John Paul was from Poland, right?

Robert Purgert [00:32:49] Yeah. But he also was. We always sometimes discuss this as that difference of approaches of dealing with them. John Paul was much more clever in the way to work through the back door with them and where Mindszenty was much more confrontational and was probably a good combination of dealing with those people.

Meg Sezemsky [00:33:09] The communists, the Russians.

Robert Purgert [00:33:11] The communists, while the Russians, particularly in Hungary and they were not well liked after that revolution. But you know, you can almost just read between the lines, the frustration of the people to go up against tanks with bottles of gasoline. You know, you must really have a deep seated hatred for that system that was there. So we were fortunate that somebody had passed away. They had left us a number of memorabilia from him. And so.

Meg Sezemsky [00:33:43] So these areas that we’re looking at in the church right now are areas where you have statues of saints. Are they saints or.

Andras Antal [00:33:53] We don’t know. This is a Jesuit saint, Father Thomas honored. And he brought somewhere, I don’t know, this, this one, St. Anne was brought here in time of nasty. And every pastor, churches was closed or demolished and they get from there to get from there and get here somewhat there. Heroic death of Irish[?]

Robert Purgert [00:34:35] World War I.

Andras Antal [00:34:36] World War, Korean War. True, the three wars.

Meg Sezemsky [00:34:42] Okay, so this is a memorial to soldiers that fought the Spanish American War, the World War I, World War II and the Korean War.

Andras Antal [00:34:49] Okay. Yeah.

Robert Purgert [00:34:53] Put up a few More.

Andras Antal [00:34:57] It is the main entrance.

Meg Sezemsky [00:34:59] Okay. These are the main doors. You would come in the main doors. And then what are the. I’m just going to ask you a lot of questions about the symbolism and different aspects of the church, if that’s okay. So what are. What is this? Is this wheat above the doorway into the sanctuary?

Andras Antal [00:35:18] Latin.

Meg Sezemsky [00:35:19] That looks like a drum.

Andras Antal [00:35:24] Ladata dominum in timpano. No, no. Laudate dominum in timpano. This is Latin.

Meg Sezemsky [00:35:35] Okay.

Andras Antal [00:35:37] To laud the Lord in timpano. What is that? Where is it?

Robert Purgert [00:35:44] Tempo and music.

Andras Antal [00:35:46] No. Yeah. This is jump or what? Dump. How would you say.

Robert Purgert [00:35:49] Oh, like a tempe and a beat.

Andras Antal [00:35:52] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Meg Sezemsky [00:35:57] So that means the Lord has a. Has a tempo.

Andras Antal [00:36:01] No, it’s we. We honor him. Honor him. Or how? I say laudate, laudate domine.

Robert Purgert [00:36:15] In laudatory it speaks so in.

Andras Antal [00:36:18] In the prayer we say.

Meg Sezemsky [00:36:21] Yeah, okay.

Robert Purgert [00:36:22] Yeah.

Andras Antal [00:36:22] We honor God or the Lord in. In timpano.

Robert Purgert [00:36:27] Okay.

Andras Antal [00:36:27] This is the. The music. Music.

Meg Sezemsky [00:36:31] And that’s for the drum instrument.

Andras Antal [00:36:32] The drum. Yeah, and drum. Yeah, drum.

Meg Sezemsky [00:36:35] And this is.

Andras Antal [00:36:37] Laudate domino in cordis at organo. Yeah.

Robert Purgert [00:36:52] So this is. These are all symbols for. To the thinking of the choir for music. Okay. And. And then in the songs.

Andras Antal [00:37:06] In songs, etc.

Robert Purgert [00:37:08] And in song and horn.

Andras Antal [00:37:11] Yo to be. Yeah.

Meg Sezemsky [00:37:17] Sono means song.

Andras Antal [00:37:18] Yeah. And the two B. That. That instruments that. That they used.

Robert Purgert [00:37:22] Okay. Songs with heart.

Andras Antal [00:37:34] This is in heart.

Meg Sezemsky [00:37:36] Okay.

Andras Antal [00:37:36] In our hearts and organo and organ.

Meg Sezemsky [00:37:39] So cortis would mean heart. Okay.

Andras Antal [00:37:41] Yeah. Oh, that. The domino in symbols. And ub. Ubilations.

Robert Purgert [00:37:51] Jubilations.

Andras Antal [00:37:52] Jubilations. In symbols. The symbols in symbols.

Meg Sezemsky [00:37:57] So if I was a- If I was coming- If I was a parishioner coming to your church, there are these- There are these alcoves on the sides that have saints, statues of saints in them. And candles. Would I- And then there’s like steps going up to it with a rug. Is this a place someone would pray at?

Robert Purgert [00:38:19] It could.

Andras Antal [00:38:20] Yeah.

Robert Purgert [00:38:22] And then during the Corpus Christi, which go outside the neighborhood, the procession will be inside. So they’ll go to these altars.

Andras Antal [00:38:32] But originally they were built for the. For the statues.

Meg Sezemsky [00:38:38] So what is the Corpus Christi?

Robert Purgert [00:38:40] That is the feast of the Body and blood of Christ.

Andras Antal [00:38:42] Yes.

Robert Purgert [00:38:42] And particularly in Europe, it’s a very, very big feast day. That. Where they will go from the church out into the community and actually stop at some side altars to say prayers and do blessings and things like that.

Andras Antal [00:38:55] Four altars north, south and west, east, symbolizes the big procession with the Eucharist.

Robert Purgert [00:39:04] And in Hungary when I was there, is that they actually decorate where the priest is going to walk. They use sand and flowers so that they decorate. It looks almost like paintings on the ground where the priest will walk in the procession. So it’s-

Andras Antal [00:39:23] Regularly the first communicant. The kids, they go and the girls.

Robert Purgert [00:39:32] It’s very, very, very nice. And then the pictures under the name of Shulich. What symbolism is here? Of course, over the top is the wheat and grapes for the body and blood of Christ. And of course, Jesus is represented as the Lamb of God on the altar of sacrifice. So you see upon that. And then of course, the Holy Spirit has the spirit and you come down onto the altar. Were kind of unique in a certain.

Andras Antal [00:40:05] Way because it symbolizes the seven sacraments.

Robert Purgert [00:40:09] Yeah.

Andras Antal [00:40:09] On these panels, Confirmation.

Robert Purgert [00:40:14] So ergo, to baptize Confirmation.

Andras Antal [00:40:30] It means. This is Latin ergo, egote baptism. I baptize you. This is the three first sacraments, the symbols and the two them. This is the Eucharist. What is a Eucharist sacrament? The sacrament. Because we have seven sacraments.

Robert Purgert [00:41:05] Oh, okay.

Meg Sezemsky [00:41:05] So it’s one of the sacraments, but it’s the one that’s over the main.

Andras Antal [00:41:11] Areas that makes sanctuary. Yeah.

Meg Sezemsky [00:41:14] Does that make it as special in some way or.

Robert Purgert [00:41:16] Yeah, because.

Andras Antal [00:41:17] Because we at Catholic Church, we keep the. The sanctuary, the sacrament all the time because of this. That is the lamp, you know. And this is the seventh sacrament in the sanctuary. They put in the Eucharist. And the other. The sacraments started from there, I think. Yeah. Ego. Matrimony, Matrimony, Holy Orders. This is the. The priest. How I said that? Holy orders, Holy order, sacrament, deacon, priest and bishop sacraments. And the last one, this is the last Right, let’s try. Yeah. The seven sacraments. The windows is very, very interesting now.

Robert Purgert [00:42:26] What the windows depict. In fact, maybe start with the one in the back. If you look at. There’s the king and he’s giving. Maybe go to this side. Yeah.

Andras Antal [00:42:37] Like the statue here with the rose legend. This is Archangel. This is Saint Anne. Saint Anne with the child Maria. This is Saint Ladislas. Yeah, yeah. This picture presents. This is from Transylvania, when he went once. This is a legend. And then in between the mountains, they didn’t found water to drink. And I think this is a relation with the Moses legend. And he, Saint Ladislas gave water from the. From the rock. And that is when Stephen offered his crown, his country and his people to the Blessed Virgin Mary. And we see that Our lady of Hungary.

Meg Sezemsky [00:43:52] Hungary and that’s why the crown. That’s why the crown and Mary.

Andras Antal [00:43:58] Yes, yes. Because he didn’t have anybody because his son died in a. Suddenly in a hunting accident in this side. Nobody knows what exactly. Or Saint Margaret of Hungary. Saint Margaret of Hungary, because he lived in the Muro Sigeta between Buda and Budapest. Small isle there we see now Margaret Siget. Margaret isle, we see. Or Saint Margaret of Hungary, but that is more Ireland, because she lived there in a.

Robert Purgert [00:44:49] Cloister.

Andras Antal [00:44:50] Yeah, cloister. Yeah. Or St. Helen in the class.

Robert Purgert [00:45:00] And this is the Assumption of Mary into heaven.

Meg Sezemsky [00:45:03] And what does that mean?

Robert Purgert [00:45:04] We believe she was assumed into heaven in both body and soul. She’s the only person the rest of us will wait for after the resurrection of the body. After she died, she was by both. Yeah. So she’s the only person that we believe actually assumed, you know, in both forms. Now we believe we will also go in that form, but after the second coming, after the next.

Meg Sezemsky [00:45:31] Do you have a concept of what that form is? Or.

Robert Purgert [00:45:34] There’s a lot of theologians that, you know, the simple way is that we think of it like us, that we’re going to go live in a big mansion. But that’s a very simplistic approach, is that the spiritual body is probably different than the human body and that we will, we are promised that after the resurrection, they have this body. [00:45:52] Now what it is. I guess we’ll have to wait and see. You know, we could all conjecture.

Andras Antal [00:45:57] It is now a dogma. It’s a dogma. Dogma now. Catholic Church. And we celebrate every year in the August 15, the. The assumption of Mary.

Robert Purgert [00:46:08] Yeah. And what a dogma, of course, is that it’s a belief that you. If you are going to be Catholic, then you say. Yeah, it’s a belief. It’s a- It’s a truism that we just.

Andras Antal [00:46:18] Yeah, for the Catholics, it’s a very important feast of Blessed Virgin Mary.

Robert Purgert [00:46:23] Well, it’s important because for us, the connection between God and man, besides Christ, is Mary. I mean, she was the only human. She was born human. And so when she was asked to do the task, to be the Mother of God, she did it. So she had all of the constraints and the thought processes as the rest of us. So, I mean, she really shows the humanist side. The debate always on Jesus is that Jesus was human and divine. And of course, that’s a theologic, you know, questions, how did he know this or not? But her, she was only human. So for a lot of us, for me in particular, she’s really kind of the model of truly she, you know, she had all exactly the feelings we had. So, you know, when you’re told you’re going to be the mother of God, that would be a tough one to swallow, you know, so. And then, of course, St. Francis with the children, and then Jesus called me.

Andras Antal [00:47:14] And stood, or could be St. Anthony Jesus.

Robert Purgert [00:47:22] And then the story about when Jesus was on the boat with his friends, with the apostles, the storm came up and he calmed the waters. And I think this is actually just Mary in heaven. There’s a lot of devotion in the Catholic Church.

Andras Antal [00:47:37] Conception, Immaculate Conception. Immaculate Conception. This is also a very important dogma. Dogma in the Catholic Church that she.

Robert Purgert [00:47:48] Was conceived without sin. People always get that mixed up thinking that Jesus was conceived without sin, without the original sin. But no, Mary was conceived without original sin.

Meg Sezemsky [00:47:58] So now that brings up a question for me. What is original sin?

Robert Purgert [00:48:02] Okay, When Adam and Eve sinned in the, in the garden, what they did is that the rest of us, mankind, primarily bore the mark of this original sin, that they had made this big mistake. Had they not done that, we would have lived in paradise. We wouldn’t have been going through all of these hassles and tribulations that are here. But for Christ to come into the body of a person is, of course, this is the Son of God is that was going to go into a person who had no sin. So it meant in her conception, when she was conceived, because we believe life begins at the instant of conception. So at her instant of conception, there was no original original sin. She’s the only one who was conceived without sin. The rest of us, when we were, from the instant of conception, we had original sin.

Meg Sezemsky [00:48:45] And original sin is the knowledge.

Robert Purgert [00:48:49] It’s the sin that is the. The. That Adam and Eve, the disobedience from the ancestors.

Andras Antal [00:48:56] Everybody thinks from the ancestors that we say original sin.

Robert Purgert [00:48:59] Yeah. So it was from them that we are born with that. And of course, what we believe is that through the sacrament of baptism, our original sin is forgiven and you’re starting off fresh.

Meg Sezemsky [00:49:11] And that’s when you’re a baby and.

Robert Purgert [00:49:12] You’Re welcomed into the community of the church without sin. Now, of course, from there forward, we know you’re going to probably stumble. And that’s where we have the sacrament of penance. And you know, life is. This is one of the hard things I think a lot of people have to accept is that life is a test. This is because of Adam and Eve. This is work. A lot of people want paradise on earth. It’s not going to happen here. Then the paradise is the next life. We just have to make the best of it.

Andras Antal [00:49:37] I think more simple. We explained that original thing, like human nature originally inclines better to the bad than to the good. This is the original sin in our human nature. Everybody has this nature and born with this nature. And because of this, only the Blessed Virgin Mary was an exception from this original nature.

Meg Sezemsky [00:50:13] And Jesus didn’t have original sin because he was divine.

Andras Antal [00:50:15] No, because.

Robert Purgert [00:50:18] And then the last one, which I’m kind of glad we saved to the end, is the one of Saint Elizabeth with the flowers in her coat. And it’s also over the altar, you can see there’s roses there. Because the story is this, is that the man who she married, she was a queen and her husband was a king and she was from Hungary. And then the kingdom where she was at was I think in southern Germany at that time or something like Warburg. Warburg. Well, the king went on the Crusades and when he came, he wound up getting killed on the crusade. And so then his brother took over. Well, his brother wasn’t so So she told her, he says, look, if I catch you one more time going out, taking food and things to the poor people, you’re going to be in big trouble. So the one day the soldiers see her and they thought they had her. So they came up and what’s under your coat? And open it up. And when she opened it up, instead of there being bread there, there were flowers so she couldn’t get arrested. But she left a very, the story is she lived a very, very devout life, particularly in service to the poor and to the sick. And that’s why a lot of hospitals are named for Saint Elizabeth because of her ministry to those people. And she died at a very young age. I think she was only in her 20s, wasn’t she, when she died? 24. So she was a very young widow.

Andras Antal [00:51:44] And her mother in law, she didn’t like her. Oh, always they have problem because she said, oh, you are, how I say, the king court. Okay, house and you. She didn’t support like a lady.

Robert Purgert [00:52:08] Yeah, she associated with the poor and the other people. That’s right. She didn’t put on the airs of the court. So they didn’t like that. And you know, they were, they were going to set her up. So.

Andras Antal [00:52:17] Yeah, many times they had, they had, they had. You know, because her mother once they were in the church and there was a cross. And I think Lenten visited the church and she took off her small crown from her head and her mother in law said, oh no, you can’t do this. She said, well, I have to take off face of Christ.

Meg Sezemsky [00:52:56] Can you tell me a little bit about the workmen, the people that built this church? Do you know anything about like who did the frescoes? Who did the marble work?

Robert Purgert [00:53:05] Who?

Andras Antal [00:53:07] I don’t know. In the book there is. We don’t have many, many sources because at that time, I don’t know Father Thomas, he was here for 43 years and we couldn’t find almost any source. They didn’t, didn’t write down nothing.

Robert Purgert [00:53:27] Yeah, so even some of the old. I think they have some of the old sketches.

Andras Antal [00:53:33] Who made the houses, the plants and everything. Father Boehm went to Rome and showed to the poor, especially buildings, the plants, everything. There is two engineers. The names are there on the found outside cornerstone Italian name. Who made all the programs or plans or something regarding the building.

Robert Purgert [00:54:07] Well, it’s a important building because to most people too, this is really the kind of the monument to the immigrant Hungarian Americans that came here because most Hungarians, two thirds are still Catholic. And I mean it’s really a Catholic country. That this was really a symbol of them coming. And it was done through their donations. I mean, we’re talking folks that like mine that started out in the foundries and the mills and I mean, you know, the typical American story. So. But we’ve been very fortunate with Father. He’s been here 20 years now, huh? Isn’t it? 20? 21.

Andras Antal [00:54:39] 23.

Robert Purgert [00:54:39] 23. Oh, see, you’re halfway done. You have only 23 more to go.

Andras Antal [00:54:44] 88. January 88, right.

Robert Purgert [00:54:46] Yeah. Hope he’d stay 24. But while he. When Father came is that the neighborhood had gone through kind of a dull. It was kind of bottoming out. So really it was through his efforts that we put in a lot of renovations here and then downstairs in the hall and things like that. It was very old and kind of needed upgraded.

Andras Antal [00:55:09] Before me was a pastor, nasty for 10 years. But he was a sick man. Yeah, he was very psychologically. During the 10 years, nobody entered to the rectory. Nobody.

Meg Sezemsky [00:55:24] Wow.

Andras Antal [00:55:24] The bishop was here. The bishop like as I heard and I think Bishop Pilla also. And only to the sacristy and down to the hall, not the rectory.

Robert Purgert [00:55:39] You.

Andras Antal [00:55:39] Know, so he was. He was a sick man.

Robert Purgert [00:55:42] He was nervous. He was a very nervous guy. Yeah, so nice guy, but he was.

Andras Antal [00:55:45] Just, you know, oh he was a professor.

Robert Purgert [00:55:48] Yeah.

Andras Antal [00:55:48] I didn’t have a professor.

Robert Purgert [00:55:50] Oh, well that answers everything if he was a professor. Now I understand.

Andras Antal [00:55:57] St. John College, Catholic College. Close. I don’t know. Yeah, that was 80s. Yeah, he was a teacher professor.

Meg Sezemsky [00:56:09] Well, when you, when you all have services now do you have like Friday night services or Saturday service? Sunday. I know, I’m sure you’re.

Andras Antal [00:56:19] We have on the only Sunday two masses at 9 o’ clock in English and 10:30 Hungarian we had for 10 years about when I came here. Saturday evening mass also then at that time we have some parishioners a little bit closer to the church or the parishioners they died out. Everyone we don’t have now close to the Shaker Square one person. That’s it. Yeah, Everybody else is everybody else from the other cities. Heights, Mayfield, so on. Everywhere. Everywhere.

Robert Purgert [00:56:57] And it’s. In the end you come because there really is comfort and familiarity. I mean, you know, you just know this place. You know, this is where you’ve been.

Meg Sezemsky [00:57:05] And when you come on Sunday you come through the front doors?

Robert Purgert [00:57:08] No, we usually come off the parking lot through the side door so it’s closer to walk and they could just come to.

Meg Sezemsky [00:57:14] So no one comes to the front door?

Robert Purgert [00:57:16] No.

Andras Antal [00:57:16] Well, sometimes we have weddings and they request. Okay. Come through the front door if a big, big funeral. When he died.

Robert Purgert [00:57:28] Yeah but otherwise because the people come to the back and the back is guarded with we have a person back there the whole time and things like that. And we’ve never. Knock on wood, I can’t think of an incident here in the whole time you’ve been here. I mean, you know, because what we do do, even our like our midnight mass on Christmas is 10 o’clock and it’s well lit. We make sure there’s people there and we. And when you really look at this area in a way there’s very few people live here anymore and it’s all industrial so I mean you know, and.

Andras Antal [00:57:58] The underground other thing that there are many, many steps there.

Robert Purgert [00:58:00] Yeah.

Andras Antal [00:58:01] And there’s no. No area. And the older people, they afraid they can’t use that steps.

Robert Purgert [00:58:07] Yeah, that’s the other reason there’s a short distance to come into the back door. And you know, of course this was built in the days where people walked here to church and came off. Now today everybody drives.

Andras Antal [00:58:18] Only these four steps started to be a problem for some of us, the older people.

Robert Purgert [00:58:26] But you know, they just didn’t make these ADA compliant at those times, ramps and things like that. And We’ve looked at a few times. We think we might have found something for like an elevator type. But see the construction of this where we would have put an elevator inside. We have a supporting beam there. We have it. It would be a big expensive thing to re. Move around because they never thought about putting an elevator shaft in that place where you normally would see it to go. So we’ve looked at a few places and worked the one they did at St. Lawrence though, that was kind of neat the way they did there. They did theirs on outside. Yeah, they just. What they did is they did it on the outside, then they just punched through the wall. So you just walk out into the elevator shaft. It’s not as- It’s not very sightly vision wise, but it does the function. But we’re looking at another one that we think might work on these stairs to go down. They have one now. You know how you’ve seen those chairs that the people ride down on the- Well, they have one now that you actually walk in on a flat. But it follows the same type of theory of a track that goes around and, you know, with the electric motors getting more and more strong, it looks like this might get us where we need to go. But the guys that need help, like the one felt on wheelchair, there’s me and a couple guys would just kind of up and down. But then he, you know, it would be better if there was a- So. So we’re hopeful we’re going to be here yet. They closed- The two other Hungarian parishes in Cleveland were closed this last year. St. Emeric’s and St. Margaret’s, and some of their folks have come here and again, too, it’s a commute, you know, because they were commuting to their churches as well, too, where Father picks up-

Andras Antal [01:00:08] In Akron, most people getting to church in Barberton and Lorain.

Robert Purgert [01:00:13] And this kind of puts a little pressure on Father because not so much for the Sunday Mass. The mass takes the same amount of time. Many people are here, but it’s the visitation to the sick. So now the area the father has to go to is wider and broader.

Andras Antal [01:00:29] The Lorain home. That is Hungarian nursing home. There are more Hungarian people. I go there every month once to see these elderly people. And then there are also other nursing homes. We have perishable nurse and assisted living homes and homebounds.

Robert Purgert [01:00:51] And we’re aging as the parish goes. And you know, in a certain way, kind of a tribute to the Americanization of the kids. Now the. The latest round of immigrants that came over, the parents they picked up English pretty well. But as I said, the kids are now in college. The kids are American, you know, so the parents other than have the kind of the social network of each other. If for them something happened here, they could still function not as easily, but their kids would have no problem functioning at mass.

Andras Antal [01:01:19] You know, the first who came from Hugo, they, they need the help in their mother language. But from the second generation, no problem.

Robert Purgert [01:01:32] But their kids also did father, because father ran a catechism for them so the kids could go to PSR, but you know, they’re not so sure on the language to begin with. So father ran his own catechism program here in addition to that, just to make sure they understood the faith as well too. But now as the kids get older, as I say.

Andras Antal [01:01:50] Oh yeah, they, they go out now.

Robert Purgert [01:01:51] They, they really.

Andras Antal [01:01:53] Yeah, their English is better now than Hungarian.

Robert Purgert [01:01:57] Yeah, yeah, it is. It is, yeah. Well, because they, they’re, they’re living the language. They use it all the time at home. And that was always the kind of the joke when the Hungarians would come to visit. The Hungarians that were here, they would hear the people talking here and they’d say, these people talk so old fashioned, because for 50 years it was kind, kind of captive, you know. And so the words that were used here weren’t the words that were the common words that were in Europe anymore. So, yeah.

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