Bishop Szabo passes away

The membership of IARF join with all who grieve the passing of Dr. Árpád Szabó, formerly Bishop of IARF member group the Transylvanian Unitarian Church.

Árpád and Magda Szabó in Ricmond Park, London, 2007

The Bishop attended our Europe & Middle East region's 2008 conference held in Belfast, where he delivered a well-received paper titled “Our common challenge: IARF, its purpose and future”.

A letter of condolence to his family and congregation from IARF's new president, Most Rev. Mitsuo Miyake, says:

Both my grandfather Most. Rev. Toshio Miyake and my father Rev. Tatsuo Miyake were well acquainted with the Bishop during their respective capacities as IARF board members. There was a special admiration for the Bishop’s resilience and leadership under the difficult conditions of socialism, when he protected what we all esteem so much in the oldest Unitarian churches in the world.

As I begin my presidency of the IARF, I would like to recall the words of Bishop Szabó at IARF’s theological conference at Kolozsvár on 18-23 of July 1994, titled Religious and Human Rights in Europe. He said “our Unitarian church and people not only preserve the traditions of the past, but also face the challenges of the present with a living faith, and are ready to take part in the building of the future too”.

Let us remember these words as we take our organisation forward, always remembering those who have given much to building it.

Please go to the Unitarian Universalist tribute site created here (ICUU).

Photos of the funeral may be seen here.