Father Diodor Todea in communist prison
Diodor Todea was born on 13 March 1906 in Arieșenii Albei into a family of hard workers. After finishing primary school in Abrud in 1915, he attended “Iosif Vulcan” grammar school in Beiuș until 1923. He then enrolled at the Theological Academy in Oradea and at the Faculty of Law in Cluj.
He graduated from the Faculty of Law in 1927 and from the Theological Academy in Cluj a year later. For the first two years he was a teacher of religion in secondary schools in Sighet, and between 1930 and 1931 in primary schools in Alba Iulia.
In 1933 he was ordained priest in the parish of “Avram Iancu”, Alba County, and from 1 May 1949 he was ordained in the village of Baciu, Cluj County. In December 1944, in the context of the events that led Romania to join the Soviet Union, a group of legionaries led by Pavel Grimalschi and Aurel Chira were parachuted by the German Air Force in the area between Alba and Cluj. Their mission was to sabotage the Soviet army in the event of a German counter-offensive. Looking for shelter and food, they were eventually helped by Father Todea, the parish priest of Baciu, and other local people. The priest helped them for several months. The years went by, and it was only in 1959, on the basis of testimony given in Securitate investigations by members of anti-communist resistance groups operating in the Apuseni Mountains, that Father Diodor Todea was arrested on 7 September. He was held under investigation in the Securitate prison in Oradea until January 1960. He was part of a group of four people who had helped the paratroopers in December 1944.
During a trip to Oradea, my father was tried by the military tribunal in Cluj and sentenced to 12 years’ hard labour by decision no. 621 of 14 June 1960. He experienced the concentration camps of Oradea, Dej (1960) and Gherla (1963). In Gherla he did forced labour. On 3 August 1964, he was released from Gherla prison and declared his residence to be in Cluj.
(Adrian Nicolae Petcu – Ziarul Lumina)