Din istoria bisericească a românilor transilvăneni. Un caz de schimbare a identităţii confesionale la Apahida (Cluj) în a doua jumătate a secolului al
From the Church History of the Romanians in Transylvania. A Case of Confessional Identity Shift at Apahida (Cluj) in the Second Half of the 19th Centu

Summary/Abstract: The case of Apahida is typical of the manner in which these denominational “transitions” occurred in the Romanian community from Transylvania during the second half of the nineteenth and the early twentieth century. The quarrels and the tensions that emerged between the two Orthodox priests proved to be fatal, ultimately, for the community, which was torn apart by confessional dissensions. Vainglory and personal interests, together with material considerations and social climbing objectives, are illustrated very well in the case of the transitions to Greek Catholicism which were registered in Apahida. The fact that Bishop Ioan Szabó received Ioan Fărcaşiu, the Archpriest of Sic, who had been left without an archpresbyteriate following the territorial redistribution of the Orthodox Archdiocese of Transylvania, and gave him the position of a Greek-Catholic archpriest and the quality of a consistorial assessor is a clear illustration of the existence of proselytism in the relations between the two Romanian denominations in Transylvania. Viewed from a historical perspective, the relations between the Orthodox and the Greek Catholics in Transylvania during the second half of the nineteenth century and the early twentieth century evince a complex picture, which was not devoid of disagreements, misunderstandings, and conflicting situations. Strategies of rapprochement and cooperation for the common good of the nation were found, however, confessional boundaries being overcome. Although the hierarchies of the two Churches insisted that the ecclesiastical and educational life of their parishioners should unfold strictly within the limits of their own confession, many concrete situations from the world of the Transylvanian villages compelled them to reconciliation and finding common solutions, especially as regards the maintenance of their schools. Conversions from Greek Catholicism to Orthodoxy (or vice versa) were most often based on the priests’ initiatives or on material difficulties, which were hardly bearable for the parishioners. Switching to “the others” did not raise special problems for the Romanian believers of the time, because these were both “Romanian Churches”, whose liturgical rituals were both held in accordance with the Eastern rite. Still, the few case studies presented in this work, based on valuable unpublished information from the archives, confirm once again the nefarious nature of confessional divisions among the Transylvanian Romanians, with negative consequences both in the sphere of ecclesiastical life and on the political-national realm.

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