Lelkészgyerekek viszonyulása az egyházhoz

Not all pastor's children remain close to the Church, despite the fact that they grew up in a religious environment and had the example and model of Christian living. The theoretical objective of my thesis is to explore pastor's children's motivations for living a pious life. For there can be external and internal motivation. The external motivation is when the pastor's child practices godly living and godly speaking, but not from an internal motivation, not from faith. They are not living a godly lifestyle because they feel they need to and because it is of value to them, but they are just living up to expectations. They behave and speak as expected by their parents, their congregation or their environment. They live godly lives either for external recognition and reward, such as the recognition of the church community or the pride of their parents, or perhaps to earn God's approval. My research shows that external motivation alone is not enough for a pastor's child to remain close to the church and retain the values he or she has seen, heard, and experienced at home. Internal motivation is necessary. The paper also points out what pastor parents and congregational communities can do to ensure that the child is not overcome by a sickening image of God, and the role of the family, especially, in developing the inner motivation to live a godly life.