I do not think that there can be a good married priest without a good presbytera. After the priesthood, I consider my wife to be the most precious gift God gave me. Everywhere and always, she was at my side supporting me. An exceptional presbytera who understood her calling and agreed to make necessary sacrifices that were not at all small.
—Fr. Julian Stoicescu
A Monk with a Family
by Presbytera Eugenia Stoicescu
Friendship
I lived with Father Julian–we were married, I mean to say–from ‘39 to ‘96, that is, 57 years. I first met him at the library of the Carol I University Foundation. I am talking about the Central University Library of Bucharest that was burnt in the December 1989 Revolution. We were each reading at our desks. I was a student. I would go there to read more often than at the university. I was working on a seminar project. He had finished [a degree in] theology, but he would still come to the library to study. I did not notice him; he did not attract my attention in any way. But he later recounted to me how it was for him. He met a man from his village who asked him:
“What are you doing, Father? Aren’t you getting married?”
“Well, if I haven’t met my life companion…” he responded.
“The earth is full of girls and you haven’t found one?!”
“Yes, but not all of them are for me and I am not for all of them. For example, I like that one at the desk there,” he said pointing at me.
“Oh, well, she is…”
And, anyway, he said a few words of praise, of appreciation about me. This was enough to mobilize him. We went out a few times, without my realizing that he was pursuing me. One day I had to go with my sister to a minister whom my father knew. She waited for me in the hall of the library. When I got up to leave, he also got up, with the thought of talking with me and getting to know me. Seeing my sister, he became disoriented. I know that he thought at that moment: “It was difficult with one, but now two!” The minister was near Cişmigiu. He came with us, still searching for the moment to strike up a conversation. The circumstances forced my sister to go alone to the office where we were supposed to go, and for me to remain outside to wait for her. Seeing me alone, he mustered the courage to approach me. It seemed to me that he was very sure of himself, but later he confessed that his knees were shaking with emotion. So he approached, greeted me very respectfully, and said to me:
“Miss, I would like to get to know you.”
“Really!? This is the classic process…”
“Yes, but it doesn’t suit me!”
There was another response that I cannot remember. We talked until my sister came out. I presented him to her. She assumed that we had known each other for a long time. But from where? That was our meeting. We left together and he drove us home. We lived somewhere near Darvari Skete. We often had to go up the road on foot because cars were expensive and I did not permit myself to use them very often. Although I warned him that we lived rather far, he was not swayed and stuck to escorting us to the front of the door, where we parted ways. After, we met almost every day at the library, because I rarely was absent from there–only when I had a seminar. At first, he seemed a bit conceited. It seemed that the reality I saw in him was just a picture, that he was posing as a good man. But that is fundamentally how he was. He did not tell me from the start that he had studied theology. He told me another time when he was taking me home. We were talking about life, about life principles, that is, generally. And, at a given moment, he let fly by accident:
“I am saying this not because I am a theologian, but because it is the way by which I judge things.”
He was attentive to my reaction at the same time. I did not react in any way. I received it simply, like a piece of information he had given me. Our relationship developed in this way. During this time he worked as a professor or teacher at Popeşti Leordeni [a town in Romania]. He had also worked there as a student, I believe. There are things that I never knew. When we met, I was 19, and when we married, 22. There were three years in which we continued to talk, and marriage could be seen on the horizon, somehow, from the beginning. About three weeks after we met, he posed the issue of marriage to me. He thought that I seemed to be the person whom he had been searching for since long ago. After we finished studying, he invited me to walk by the road. At that time there were carriages. Later he told me he was thinking this:
“If a carriage with two, white horses appears on the road, it is a sign from God that I must tell her what is on my soul.”
And, just as we were exiting the building, a carriage with two, white horses appeared around the corner. This was an extraordinary sign for him. He invited me to take that carriage. I thought it was an unfitting act of courage, not to say more. A bit indisposed, I nonetheless climbed into the carriage. We reached the main road, where we got down and began walking. I do not remember what season it was, but I know that it was very beautiful outside. It was at an hour when there were very few people. And then he asked me to marry him. It was totally unexpected for me. I had not even thought of such a thing. Then, I had never thought of marrying a priest. I had spent time in completely different circles. My brother was in the military high school. I was in a group of his friends and I saw my future going in that direction as well. Julian told me about how he saw life and the priesthood. Very beautiful things, but totally new for me. I did not have any restraint. Despite my surprise, I told him:
“If you are the one speaking, then I agree to be your wife.”
The response came from a place of courtesy because at that stage we could not yet talk about sentiments. They were still unclear; they were not determined. My response contained an “if.” Afterward, he repeated that word to me many times. We continued to walk for some time, after which he drove me home. I told my parents, somewhat amused, about what had happened. My parents did not even know him, because he would drive me to the door. This was the beginning. Afterward, as is normal, things evolved. Later I met his parents. We went to Câmpulung. It was the feast day of Saint Panteleimon when a great festival is held. It was a very big event for that area, for which everyone prepared long beforehand. People came from all over.
He got two hotel rooms and we slept there, where his mother was. We walked throughout the festival. There, in Câmpulung, I met his mother for the first time. I also remember how we met a priest’s wife who had a very beautiful face but was kind of young in age. As parents are more practical, this lady had eyes on Julian for her daughter. She insisted on it very much to Julian, seeking to make him understand that it is not good to be with a student because they are such and such a way. She tried to scare him. After she met me, she no longer had this restraint. At first, the woman was very adverse, but at a given moment she ceded. She understood him. So, afterward, we took a carriage and left Câmpulung for Gănești, a road of about 30 km, so that I could meet his parents. Poor man, I think he spent the rest of his money on these expenses.
Marriage
After three years of knowing each other, after I finished university, we got married. The marriage was held at his home in Gănești; it was like a wedding in the countryside. There in the village, he was highly appreciated, very admired, and as such very solicited. His mother was very well known in the neighboring villages because she was the region’s midwife. And her son was handsome, good-looking, serious, and quiet. Many would have liked to have him as their son-in-law. I think the marriage was sensational for the whole valley.
There were quite a few rich people in the villages. His mom sometimes tried to suggest others to him:
“Dear, look, that girl would be good!”
Anyway, she sought to convince him with the hope of having him near her, becoming a priest in the village or a nearby village. He responded to her like this:
“No, I want to marry her. If you do not agree, then know that I will not get married at all. I will go to a monastery and remain there, unmarried.”
There were some discussions of this kind.
There was a kind of square in front of their house. Only relatives lived around them. One of them had a house with a porch, like a kind of balcony. When I, the bride, came out to go to the church–see Lord–there was a great rumor, because the whole village was seeing me for the first time, and I was his chosen one. The war had already started. It was August 27. The Germans had invaded Poland. My relatives were not able to come from Bucharest or Ardeal. Only my parents were at the wedding. Neither could my brother come because he was in the military. Father Ion Bărbulescu, who was also from Gănești (his father was the village priest, and he married us) was our sponsor. He served at St. Silvestru Church until he was about 90.
The wedding was held like in the countryside–for two days. We moved from one backyard to another. Father played a bit, not much. Immediately after the wedding, we left for Bucharest. At first, we rented a place.
Ordination and the first years of serving
He was ordained a deacon at Mavrogheni Church and, after a time, a priest at St. Katherine, by His Eminence Joseph, who was also his sponsor for the priesthood and his spiritual father for many years. But for a period of two years, he was simply a deacon. In the first year of our marriage, we saw each other briefly and rarely. During the week, both of us worked: I at the CEC [Bank] and he as the secretary to an advisor at the Patriarchate. Saturday afternoon he would leave for Ţigăneşti [women’s monastery] and would return Sunday evening. And on Monday we would begin again with work. Beginning Saturday afternoon until Sunday evening I was absolutely alone, with a book I was reading. This was for a period of two years, while he was a deacon at Ţigăneşti, but with residence in Bucharest.
Afterward, we moved to the monastery, with all of our belonging. When we left for Ţigăneşti we had Liana, but until we got settled there, we had her stay with my mom in Orăştie, for a period of six months. They gave us a small home there. The nuns loved Father very much. But in the beginning, they watched him with some reticence, especially the older ones. They had had their own experiences there, sometimes unpleasant. But after they met him they loved him extraordinarily. So that he would not leave the monastery, they arranged a larger, more beautiful house for him. As he always said, his stay in the monastery was very beneficial for him. There, life was even busier, because day after day he was in church–even at night. He loved the nighttime services in the monastery. He went to them regularly. He barely put his head down, and a nun would knock on the fence.
“Have mercy on us!”
He would immediately get dressed and leave. That is why Father Mina Prodan liked him so much: because he never missed nor was late to his duty, to church. After midnight, Father Mina, who was strict with all under him, would come to find him. Father Mina Prodan was a self-taught priest. I cannot say he was at the height of Father Cleopa of Sihastria, but he was a great authority among monks at the time. At first, he received Julian with hostility, somewhat reserved. He studied him very much and when he had gotten to know him better, he realized that he was obedient, submissive, and modest. He embraced him with love and said:
“Now I want to teach you what I did not teach others.”
And, truly, Father Mina taught him very many things. He taught him all the service, all the details of the services–which we do not observe in church–the Proskomede, all the moments. He taught him an extraordinary amount. It benefited him his whole life. Father Mina was a tougher priest, but he was actually a father for Julian: he loved him very much! Julian was more serious than other young priests, he attended to his service more; he was not absent from church. He was as Father Mina liked: a kind of monk.
Of all the places that he went to as a priest, he probably felt the best at the monastery, Ţigăneşti. He was a deacon for two years and a priest for two years there. His experience there made him say that if he were in charge of the Church’s organizational affairs, he would make the graduates of theology spend time at a monastery before being ordained priests. There they could learn to pray. That is where he learned.
A miraculous event
I remember a miraculous event. It was around the beginning of our time there. We had a very modest house, which had a porch in front. And we were sitting there one day, on that porch, worried about our financial situation at that moment. Our situation, in general, was not very good. His salary was very small; he did not have extra income as a deacon. If the faithful came to the monastery, they would give to the priests or nuns, but not the deacon. The deacon had the salary he was given. But, at the same time, a missionary school by the Red Cross was established, where they hired him as well as a professor. He received something from there too. Still, the money was not enough for us. The situation was difficult enough, and at a given moment, we no longer had any money. Liana was young.
“What should we do now, Julian”–I told him–“like this, without any money, without anything in the house?” Because we did not even have bread.
“Let it be, dear, because God will take care of it.”
And I do not remember what else he said. I was looking at him with quite a bit of disbelief, but there was nothing I could do. Then he went to the church, but I remained on that porch–it was a high porch. I was wearing an apron because I was cleaning some vegetables. I was not even used to such a situation, at the limit.
At a given moment, I heard a nun shouting:
“Father Julian, come here!”
As I was mulling over my thoughts, I see him, after a time, coming from the church very well-disposed. He approached me and filled the apron pocket with money. Mother Theodora, the treasurer, had given him the four-month overdue salary. At the time there were many metal coins, and paper bills, I do not even know if we had any. Of course, he said something to me in the sense of never losing hope:
“Well, didn’t I tell you that God will take care of it? Look how He did!”
The arrest
Before being arrested, in ‘60, he felt something, something unclear. We somehow sensed the arrest. There was unrest in us. He felt that he was in their [the communists’] attention. He did not tell me anything specific, but only that:
“I feel that there is something, there is something around us.”
It is as if something was weighing on us, like a heavy weight. We felt that we needed to stay closer to one another, to communicate more. We also had visible signs. They would come and ask about us in the parish. Then, in ‘60, he went to stay at Sinaia for a few days, at the monastery, because he felt very tired. He asked me to come after him. He was waiting for me. And then he told me for the first time:
“You know, I think difficult days await me.”
Whether someone told him, or he observed something in some way, I do not know, I did not find out. Because I, when I saw a reticence in him, immediately thought that this may be tied to the vows he had made or the bonds he had as a priest. Maybe they were things discovered in confession. And I stopped, I did not insist. Fine, neither was it my style to get too involved in his dealings with the faithful. Two days before the arrest, we already did not have peace. After, I learned that the other priest had been called into questioning by the secret police and asked about Father. But he did not tell us anything at the time.
Father was arrested, apparently on the basis of a set-up, on a day of Easter (April 17, 1960), in the middle of the wave of arrests of priests at the time.
What had happened? In 1952, a man from the Apărătorii Patriei [parish] pretending to be a professor of Greek and Latin appeared at the parish house, saying his wife had left him, and that he was fired from teaching by the department due to a political motive. At the time, I believed him. He was dirty, with signs of lice; he had shoes with holes in his soles; he seemed like a very poor man in a state of decay. I told him:
“Mister, if you truly are so dirty, give me your shirt to wash, because I am doing the laundry now. I will wash your shirt, and you can come to get it tomorrow.”
I gave him food to eat, I took his shirt and washed it, and I gave him a pair of shoes. In fact, he did not have any business with me, but he did not have any other option and he gave me his shirt. Truly, it was very dirty. I washed it, and the next day it was ironed. When he came, I gave it to him. The man was not satisfied with just that, he came back a few more times; he followed Father. He wanted to catch Julian in some way. He asked him for money. I do not know how much he gave him; enough that, after, he came to our home again to eat. Then, I began to have ideas. I did not trust him very much at the beginning, and after that, I started to be very concerned. I realized that something was not right. After, at a certain point, he disappeared as suddenly as he had appeared, which increased my suspicion. It was clear that he had served his role. A wretch, probably, or who knows, someone who had fallen into their [the communists’] hands and they had blackmailed, they had used. In 1960, he would be one of the principal witnesses to accuse him. The man had been used by the secret police like bait, and no fewer than 300 priests were sentenced to prison on the basis of his testimonies.
Father was accused of aiding a legionnaire [a right-wing political activist]. In fact, I was the one who had somewhat of a connection to this person, not Father. But they were seeking to eliminate good priests who had an influence on the faithful.
They took Father while he was in bed. It was the second day of Easter, on April 17, at night, after the first day of Easter going into the second day. We found ourselves with the secret police at night. He was sick with a cold, and he was all sweaty with a high fever. And the men from the Secret Police told him to come with them, that they have business with him. I tried to retaliate:
“What are you doing, don’t you see that he is sick?”
They also saw, that there was medicine on the table. The doctor had just been there. His illness was not simulated. And, then, they were very confounded. They did not really know what to do. They did not want to go against the orders they had been given. They made a fake search [of the house] because they knew there was nothing to find. They looked there, over there, they opened drawers. In the end, they all stepped outside, three-four of them, and they discussed among themselves, after which they said:
“Come with us. Do not worry, missus, because we have medicine that will make him healthy.”
And that is how they took him. The little children, Manel and Ionut, were fast asleep. Only Liana woke up.
After the arrest, before he was sentenced, a higher-up from the Religious Affairs told me not to grieve him so much, because they discovered that he plotted against the state with the nuns from Ţigăneşti, that he had apparatuses of communication, and so on, that he was a villain; they sought to dump all this on my head.
When Father was arrested, he was suffering from a heart problem. I requested to send him some nitroglycerin pills, a newer medicine at the time, to the jail in Uranus. They did not approve it, telling me that it is not possible, that nitroglycerin is explosive material:
“What, do you want us to be launched into the air?”
I did not know anything until the trial, and the trial was in August. During all that time, Father remained arrested here, in Bucharest, at Uranus. He never told me anything about the way in which he was imprisoned. What I know, I know from what others told me. He told others some things, but he did not tell me. I know, for example, that at one point he did not have any toenails. I know this from others as well, but he also confirmed it.
I was also summoned to the investigation. And Liana was summoned. At the trial, she too was quoted as a witness.
Both of us were witnesses of the accusation. But, until then, I was taken to interrogation twice and subjected to all kinds of threats, in order to say what I knew about Father’s conspiratorial activity. I never saw Father during the interrogations. And they had no business with me! They maintained that he was conspiring against the state, and they wanted to learn something about this from me. Stupidities! In reality, what had happened? In the interrogation, they asked me about that man who had come to our home in 1952. I told them:
“I do not remember, I do not know him!”
I did not want to admit anything. They showed me a photograph, but I maintained that I did not recognize it. The accusation was that I hosted the man in ‘52. In fact, I did not host him. How?! No, not even! He came for me to feed him. In the confrontation, they brought the man so that I would see him. He was arranged nicely now, with his hair cut. He seemed like anything but a prisoner. For a long time, my conscience troubled me, that this happened because of me, which led to his arrest. But, in the end, others opened my mind. The lawyer as well. Others paid for the lawyer because we did not have any money in the house for such an expense.
The trial came. At the trial, the investigator took me outside, they had not yet brought out the prisoners, and he threatened me with the grave things that would happen if, until the session began, I did not acknowledge what he desired, namely, that I recognized that man. But, by then I was tough, nothing shook me anymore. That person supposedly was a legionnaire, and Julian was accused of helping a legionnaire. This was the chief point of the accusation. After he threatened me, I entered the room. They brought in the accused. Julian tried to look back to see me. My hair had turned completely white in the meantime. When he saw my white hair, he was very moved. They called me to the bench as an accusatory witness as well. They asked me why I had not collaborated with them, and why Father had collaborated. I told them that he [the supposed legionnaire] did not inspire any trust in me.
“But by? They asked me.”
“Well, he did not have an identification card; he said that he did not have work.”
I said exactly what the investigator told me to not say. They did not use Liana as a witness, with the motive that she was too young when these things took place.
Something very interesting that impressed Julian as well happened in regard to the defense witnesses. The lawyer told me to look for witnesses. Now, to whom was I to go? I went to one of the advisors of the Church whom I somewhat knew (I forgot his name; I did not know the advisors very well; I think he had a bakery) and I asked him to be a defense witness, without knowing that he had had a dispute with Julian. It was not quite a conflict, but he had upset Julian very much because he had claimed some imaginary things. An investigation followed and the protopresbyter made the advisor swear on the Gospel and the cross that what he was claiming was true. Ultimately, he acknowledged that what he was claiming was not real. But I did not know these things. I went to him, in good faith, and I asked him to come to the trial as a witness. He was very happy to come. It was not at all simple, but he did not have the slightest restraint. Only after did I realize why. Julian could not believe his eyes when he saw him–he told me why many years later. Especially when he heard how nicely he talked about him. The most beautiful testimony was the one given by that advisor. Of course, it was not taken into consideration. He said how during the war, Father went to the Russian prisoners of war camp and helped them. He did not do it for political reasons. All that he did, he did as a priest, never with any other thought. There was another defense witness: a former teacher, pensioned, who now had a landscaping business. He was a propagandist or activist, as they were called at the time. He also spoke very nicely. These two witnesses did as much as ten of the accusation’s. But none of it was taken into consideration when the sentence was made.
Following this, another trial took place in which the sentence was given. He was condemned to nine years in prison, plus the loss of certain civil rights and the confiscation of his belongings. The belongings were the armchair which he sat on in Olimpului, and he had another one that was similar–they were tattered. I redeemed them for money. I had to pay on the spot; I gave nearly 900 lei for both of them. Otherwise, they did not find anything else in the house that they could take. All were scraps. These were all our “belongings” that were recorded and confiscated. Oh, they took our piano as well. In fact, it was an upright piano. Someone wanted to personally give it to Julian, but Julian said:
“What can I do with it?”
He did not think that he also had a daughter who could learn to play the piano. And so it was donated to the church. The choir used it for repetitions, it was very useful. We kept it in the house because Father Cristea came and we needed to free up the chancellery so that he could stay in it. We had a lawsuit for that piano; I went with proof that it belonged to the church, showing that it was not a personal belonging, and that there was no reason for us to redeem it because it did not belong to us, because it was the church’s.
With my husband in prison and three children to raise
Julian had such trust and such hope in God that this thought alone calmed him. I cannot say that he did not think about our condition in his absence, but he knew that he left us in the care of God. This is what he said:
“I knew that God was taking care of you.”
And, truly, that is how it was. I never felt the hand of God so much in my life (well, through his prayers!), I never felt so protected as during that time.
People, in general, did not distance themselves from me, except for two instances in which I too exaggerated. The moment I felt someone was reticent, I withdrew so as to not give them the occasion to defend themselves or to manifest it in some way. That is all I had, two instances. But in the rest, no.
I had, alongside the consideration which was given to me in our community there in the church, alongside the respect which was always shown to me in any circumstance, my material needs met, strictly speaking. I found myself with people coming from places I had not imagined. All kinds of people came, poor people came too, themselves rather deprived.
From the point of view of food and money, I did not have the slightest lack when Father was in prison. People brought us an extraordinary amount. Some made a monthly donation in order to create an income for me. Not large sums, but they added up. Maybe I even had more than before. I was helped so much by the parish that I would give to others from what was given to me. I felt that Someone was watching over me.
But an old, Macedonian woman impressed me extraordinarily. She was very old–I do not know how old she was, but in any case, she could barely walk. She went about in socks, dressed in black, as Macedonian women do. I saw her coming, holding onto the railing and walls to bring me five lei. I saved that money, and now they are in front of an icon; I put them there at the time and that is where they remained. They were devalued–the currency changed–but I kept them there. She died and Father did not get the chance to see her when he returned from prison.
I did not really spend money. It did not make sense to me to enjoy myself or make plans for the future. I did something. Still, we had enough for the kids; the kids did not suffer.
Our oldest daughter had difficulties in school because she had a record. When she finished the seventh class a festivity took place at school. There were notebooks in which professors wrote. She received high praises. After, she went to high school at Şincai. She was among the best, but she did not receive honors. When she went to take the baccalaureate to get into university–she applied for Philology–I hired a professor to prepare here, to test her. He did a few lessons with her after which he said:
“Dear, you will have an academic career. I foresee this for you.”
She was, truly, very smart, very capable. She did not study that much, but she caught on quickly. And she read very much. But, of course, she was rejected, her record had a large zero. I sent our oldest son to my sister in Orăştie, and he went to school there. It would have been difficult here, they would have hurt him all the time. He was always valedictorian.
Freedom
For a time, those who were released from prison started returning. One day, I received a telegram from him, a notification that he will arrive on a certain day, and to wait for him. We went to the station, my sister and I, with her husband and his brother. Maybe with Liana too. And we waited, waited, waited. We waited. Trains full of freed prisoners were arriving, but he did not appear at all. You had the impression that they were coming from the front. You could recognize the priests especially. You recognized them by their look, even though they were not dressed like priests and did not have beards. There were many people waiting, and they came in an entire convoy; it is as if they exited the prison gate at that moment. When I saw that they were beginning to thin out and he was not appearing, I asked one of them whom I realized was a priest where he was coming from, and if he knew Father Julian.
“How can I not?! He must be here too, among us, because I saw him at the station!”
But he had taken the train in the opposite direction, towards Orăștie. At a certain point, I gave up because there were no more people. I went home worried. I could not understand what had happened; I became very worried; I was emotional. I received another telegram at home, in which he gave me a new arrival date. He wrote that he would arrive that coming Sunday. What had he done? He had first gone to Orăștie because it was much closer to Aiud. He went to see my family, and then he learned that my father had died. He went with Father Sabău because they could not be separated. In prison, in Aiud, when they met, it was a great joy for Father Sabău, who had been there for some time.
“Oh, Julian, how happy I am to see you here!”
This was what he exclaimed.
“Bravo! You are happy, you are happy for my misfortune!”
Their friendship grew even stronger there, and when they were released from prison, they could not bear to be separated. In fact, Father Sabău was from the region of Orăștiei. They were friends from before. Father Sabău was classmates with my brother-in-law. It was enough for them to see each other and not want to be separated.
For me, though, what took place then was a very difficult trial. But he did what he felt he needed to do at the moment; he was drawn to the family, to go to my parent's place in that area. He stayed there for a night.
He came home one Sunday; in church, you could actually hear the news that he had returned. The church was full of people. He did not escape what he feared: he did not want to appear on a day like that, with the service [going on], but it happened that he came exactly on a Sunday. Father was completely changed; he was unrecognizable. In the first place physically–he was very thin. It was visible in his release paper photograph. He did not have a beard; [his head was] shaven like a recruit. When he arrived home, of course, a commotion was made in church. Everyone was in tears of joy. Some were curious to see him, of course. Then, after Father Costică anointed them, nearly everyone came to our home to see him. He was in the yard; he came out to the yard because he was not able to receive them in the house. The yard was full, like at a pilgrimage to relics. They came to kiss his hand. Each said two-three words of greeting. There were great emotions. Finally, slowly but surely, things went back to normal.
And something had changed in his being. Before, he had a way of being categorical–his own way–he did not make concessions in his principles of life, behavior, and belief. After prison, he became very gentle. He was not a harsh man, but…
In general, he did not say anything about prison. Neither did I want to insist; I never asked him. What I learned, I learned completely by chance, and I learned more from those who returned from prison before him, be it because he asked them, be it by their own initiative out of love for him. They came to meet his family.
“I thanked God for the moment He sent him to us in prison, to be with us there!” That is what one of them told me.
And Father Sabău said the same thing. He said that Julian taught them to pray, by the fact that all the time he was only in prayer. That is, he did not teach them to pray in a scholarly way, but through his demeanor and the way in which he himself prayed.
Father Julian and family life
Father was kind of a recluse–if I were to define him. He loved his family and the idea of a family. He did not want to go to a monastery; he wanted a parish, he wanted to have a family and live in the middle of a city with his family. But I said it like this: in his soul and in his whole being, he was made for the monastery, for monasticism, because he was a recluse, in his own way. He did not communicate very much with us. He was a recluse even in the family. By this, I do not want to say that he did not talk or that we did not discuss different things, but everything revolved around his preoccupation in relation to the Church. Worldly things, so to speak, did not interest him. Current affairs did not interest him.
The children existed for him, without a doubt, and he loved them very much, but not with very evident manifestations. He did not communicate very much. He was in a world of his own. He struggled to enter into ours as well. He had very good intentions. For example, when I tried to make the children happy, like with a Christmas tree or celebrating their birthday and name day, he did not see the point in these acts. He was not opposed to them; I cannot say that he was opposed to or disapproved of them, but neither was he pleased. He did not participate. He would have a look of disbelief. Well, neither was he used to such things from a young age at home, and this left its mark. He did not participate in preparations, but he allowed them.
When we would have someone over for dinner, he was more focused on being present. He did not realize that there also needed to be something in the house, that someone was coming and you had to welcome him and put something in front of him, especially if he had been on the road. Such a thing was outside of his concern. When he was provoked, he responded, but he was not someone whom you would say maintained a family atmosphere; you saw that he was not trained for such occasions.
It is difficult to say so that I do not make a mistake. I cannot say that he was not a family man; in principle, he loved his family. But in his essence, he was not a family man. He was made to be a monk. I say this now as well, and I always said it.
Someone defined him very well with a word, which I too finally adopted. It was a second cousin of his, the oldest son of Father Eugen Bărbulescu from St. Silverstru [Church]. Once, when he visited us, he asked me what Julian was doing. After I told him, he said:
“Eh, that’s how he is; he remained a recluse.”
This word was truly the most fitting. Because, being among us, he was still alone. He was a monk with a family.
At the time there were speakers, of which all the houses were full. At least at our home, there at the “Apărători” parish, people did not have a radio; in the end, we got a speaker. Well, at our home, while the church service was going on, the speaker was not allowed to be on; it had to be off. Father was against it.
The same thing later on with the television. When Liana got it–because she had the most courage to bring the television–this was his response: “We put the devil in the house!” He was not at all pleased.
In fact, this could be seen in all his attire, from the time I met him. From the time he was made a priest, he did not change his priestly clothing. In fact, from the time he was ordained a deacon, I never again saw him in civilian clothing. He loved the cassock so much that he did not take it off. Neither did he have other kinds of clothes, other than a long, black robe that he wore around the house. He would not wear something other than the cassock for anything in the world.
Liana had gotten older. She would have wanted friends and classmates to come to our home. She had to celebrate her birthday elsewhere–at our home, she could not. Our house was in the church’s courtyard, and he did not allow parties in it. He did not impose all of this in a direct way, he was not tyrannical, but we knew that he did not like it and did not agree with it. And, in general, we respected his needs.
He was different in his youth; he was more insistent. He sought to be more convincing in what he thought and to more insistently require answers from others in conformity to his expectations.
In regard to family life, I cannot say he was very severe; he was rather too integral. And it was difficult for you to be otherwise around him. He imposed without forcing the issue. I never met and never knew a man better than him. And I have said this from the time I met him. And his attitude changed over time: he became more concessive and open, more and more understanding–especially after prison.
It is as if he was more silent around those to whom he was closer. I do not know why. It happened with us, with his family. And he did not do it [on purpose], O Lord, because it would have been sad. You could tell that he was preoccupied, he was thinking, something was going on…his mind was working. There were people with whom he spoke more openly; maybe he made an effort when he spoke more. Maybe his mode of living, within himself, was not the one when he was more talkative, but the other one, the quieter one.
After Father’s death
After he died, I continued to feel his presence. Maybe this phenomenon occurs in other families as well. I, however, have lived this state; until then I had not. And something else happened that I cannot explain, and which shook me at the time. I was at the cemetery the winter after his death. There was snow. I lit a candle. After I closed the little door of the lantern, I felt a different kind of warmth. But the warmth was not coming from the candle but from the cross. I looked to see: the candle, with its small flame, could not have given off so much warmth. Well, a warmth hit me. Not a heat, I cannot call it that, but a very pleasant warmth, which troubled me at the time, at that moment.
I dreamt of him many times. He was like a presence in the house. I do not remember if he spoke. My parents died; I did not have him with me when they died. The connection with him was different. Each time I go to his grave, I return at peace. I did not mourn at his grave; I never cried at his grave. I never felt the emotion of weeping, desperation, regret, or pain. I feel all of these more so at home when I long for him. I can barely wait to go to the cemetery; and when I go there, I calm down and return home at peace. It is as if a desire of mine were quenched and fulfilled.
Excerpt from Un preot de foc: Parintele Iulian [A priest of fire: Father Iulian]