About Father Arsenie Papacioc’s life in Aiud prison

At the Burning Bush trial in November 1958, Father Arsenie Papacioc was sentenced to 20 years’ hard labour. He was accused of “conspiracy against the social order”, but the communist authorities knew very well that his main crime was his ability to lead people on the path of faith, in total contradiction to the aspirations of the regime. After his conviction, the priest was sent to the terrible prison of Aiud, where he had been imprisoned before 1948. But the prison regime was different. It was a regime of physical extermination for re-education according to the wishes of the communist regime. We have many testimonies about this prison regime from those who knew Aiud. In addition, there are the documentary testimonies, from which we reproduce some fragments of Father Arsenie’s life.

In April 1960, an informer in Aiud said: “When I came out of solitary confinement in February, I spent two days in room 49 in Zarca with Papacioc Anghel. He was suffering from cold and hunger and was in a state of nervous excitement. He was blowing into his fists and pacing the room, trying to keep warm. “My brother, this is how a man ends his days. They are not to be trifled with, they have no pity or understanding – souls of stone.” Then he continued: “God has put us to a great trial, blessed be His name. Therefore, my brother, we must always be ready with a prepared and pure soul to receive the holy sacrifice that the Lord offers us. A Holy Father said: You do not know when your days are over, always be ready”… I then showed Father Arsenios that I was at the end of my strength, that my heart was failing me and that I was living in a confused state of collapse in which my hopes were beginning to fail me. Brother, do not lose hope in God – mortal sin, wake up at the twelfth hour and put your hope in the One above, think and shudder at what awaits you on the other side if you do not try to save yourself here, for you know that the torments of hell are not even remotely like the torments we are living today. It is much more terrible there”.

Father Arsenie Papacioc is also depicted in the information documents drawn up in Aiud, while he was conducting services in his cell. In November 1963, a Securitate source reported: “Time and the events he has lived through have made him ‘wiser’, as he often likes to say. His strong faith in God keeps his spirits up and gives him hope of imminent liberation. He is constantly preparing for this. In addition, he had the satisfaction of knowing that the people around him were “good” and were being cultivated in the “spirit of God” by listening to his teachings. In the morning, as in the past, he would officiate in front of the stove with his eyes towards the door, kneeling only briefly while the “Holy Spirit” was called down to fill him with holiness. He gave up the cup of water and the “morsel” of bread, the Body and Blood of the Lord, and the threaded garment that he once wore around his neck as an epitaph. And he makes the crosses more in his mind than with his hand, being very careful not to look so as not to be seen. Uță and I are made to sit meekly on the bed and take part in the service in silence, as if nothing had happened. Opposite me, “Brother Dumitru” is making small talk all the time, tugging at the priest out of the corner of his eye and bowing piously whenever he puts his hand to his forehead. Then he looks at me to see if I’m doing the same. After the bread and coffee, the priest, a little tired after Mass, takes a nap for half an hour and then begins to preach to us with enthusiasm, pointing out the importance of the day for the Church (if he remembers the calendar tab) or telling something interesting from the Paterikon, Philokalia, Pidalion, etc.”. For such manifestations, the priest was severely punished. For example, on 12 November 1963, Father Arsenie was found by the guard “making religious propaganda with the other prisoners in the room”.

According to the warden’s note, “the prisoner spoke so loudly in the room that what he said could be clearly heard in the room and in the adjacent rooms”. Consequently, the warden proposed a punishment of “10 days solitary confinement with strict regime”, starting on 24 December 1963. These are just a few of the documentary testimonies of the eminently spiritual attitude of Father Arsenie Papacioc in prison. He maintained the same attitude when he was forced to attend the re-education sessions initiated by Colonel Crăciun. Arsenie Papacioc was thus a model of spirituality for his fellow prisoners in the dreaded Aiud prison.

(Adrian Nicolae Petcu – Ziarul Lumina)