Fr. Atanasie (Sandu) Ștefănescu (en)

Alexandru Ștefănescu, nephew Sandu – for the younger ones – or monk Atanasie, in the last years of his life, was a model of faith, behaviour, uprightness and constant devotion. An Oltean from the Corabiei region, he had been a member of the Brotherhood of the Cross since his youth, following with the impetus of youth the principles of moral and Christian education of the Legionary school of unceasing sacrifice for the spiritual progress of the Romanian nation. A turbulent life of arrests, dungeons and camps followed. When you have given all the energy of your life, all the strength […]

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Alexandru Ștefănescu – Monk Atanasie – (born 1919), originally from the commune Orlea (Oroles-Vulturul), Romanați County, attends high school in the town of Corabia and is expelled for organising an FDC group. He comes from a family of legionaries, his father being an aide to General Cantacuzino. Since 1937, he was secretary to the county governor Alexandru Cristian Tell. He took part in the Uria camp, having worked more than 100 hours at the Gutenberg headquarters. At the County Chief’s suggestion, he is given the rank of Legionnaire. After the assassination of Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, he was ordered to re-establish […]

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If you looked at Sandu Ștefănescu when he spoke, you’d say he was a flame. This combustion that fuelled his inexhaustible energy was not organic, genetic, I would say, perhaps genetic in the sense of Father Arsenie Boca, that is, of another substance, from other fields or realms, because he was not just any man, but an incandescent person, special, who lived and nourished himself differently from his peers.

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In the third week of the Triodium, which is called the week of the Terrible Judgement of the Saviour Jesus Christ, on a Friday, 29.02.2008, Father Atanasie Ștefănescu, monk of the Petru Vodă Monastery, known by the monastery’s inhabitants and pilgrims as the monastery’s doctor-priest, went to the Lord. Father Atanasie, who reached the age of 86 after 20 years in communist prisons, crowned his beautiful life with a higher one by taking the monastic habit in 2005. After three years of spiritual life in the Oblate community of Petru Vodă, marked by the eternal cadence of the sacrifice and […]

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The Romanian monasteries are poor, deprived of today’s lack of generosity. But while they are in this state of impoverishment and exhaustion, our monasteries keep the right faith pure and unadulterated. Within the protection of their sacred walls, souls still flicker, thirsting for a light from above and longing for communion with the unique and eternal life proclaimed by our Saviour Jesus Christ. Secular culture has been forced to acknowledge the values of Eastern culture in the shadow of the monasteries, the ethical and intellectual value of the monastery as an institution. No more can be said of secularism, which […]

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…The following Sunday I had another adventure. A field of sunflowers had to be harvested, the flowers beaten and stored, and the stalks tied into sheaves and made into string. As it was the last one left, we decided that the older ones, including Trifan and Marian, should return to Galda, and the others after the work was done. The remaining 10-15 of us harvested the sunflower “hats” during the week, stored them in a shed in the field and cut the coconuts. We wanted to crush the hats and store the seeds. The militiamen who had shamed the hay […]

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I met Father Atanasie of Petru Vodă in the spring of 2006. It was the first time I had come to Petru Vodă Monastery, together with my husband (we were just friends then) and some other acquaintances. On the way I was very ill, maybe because of the speed, maybe because of the emotions… who knows? We arrived at the monastery late, I think it was one o’clock at night, because we went straight to mass. The next day, my indisposition continued. My husband knew Father Athanasius; he had spoken to him several times before and knew that he was […]

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