15,000 forint - 125th anniversary of Sára Salkaházi’s birth

The Magyar Nemzeti Bank is issuing a silver collector coin with a face value of 15,000 forints named ‘Boldog Salkaházi Sára’ (beatified Sára Salkaházi) and its non-ferrous metal version of 3,000 forints on 11 May 2024 to honour the life of the nun member of the Sisters of Social Service who died as a martyr. The coin, to be issued in honour of the 125th anniversary of sister Sára, who received the Righteous Among the Nations award, was designed by DLA sculptor László Szunyogh. Sára Salkaházi was born as Sarolta Schalkház in Kassa on 11 May 1899. After gaining a degree as a teacher, she followed her ambitions and became a writer. She had her writings published in the Esti Újság (Evening Paper) in Košice under a pseudonym. Social issues were in the centre of her attention even then: mostly she wrote about Hungarians giving the minority population, poor workers and distressed, jobless people. She joined the Sisters of Social Service in 1929. That year saw her entering the path of a nun, which only strengthened her social sensitivity. As a social worker, she served the poor, the ones living on the fringes of society and the people in oppression by establishing charitable organisations in Košice and Komárom, by working as a teacher, managing a dining facility for children and a store selling devotional articles in addition to overseeing a poorhouse. In 1941, she became the national manager of the Katholikus Dolgozó Nők és Leányok Szövetsége (Coalition of Working Catholic Women and Girls), edited the movement’s newspaper and gave lectures. In addition, she opened poorhouses and began the foundation of a college for working women. During World War II she saved nearly 100 Hungarian Jewish people from persecution. She also shared common destiny with the people who had been deported On 27 December 1944, members of the Arrow Cross Party shot the sister, who shared her fate with other deportees, into the Danube, along with many other prisoners. Sára Salkaházi was honoured with the Righteous Among the Nations award by Yad Vashem in 1969, and on 17 September 2006, the Catholic Church recognised her entrance into a state of bliss (beatification), which is a step towards canonization.