Father Stăniloae – lecturer in the Aiud prison

In the bath I sat among such good people as Father Beju, Father Grebenea… Professor Manu, who was about three cells away from us, gave lessons in English and American history, which he passed on to us. (…)

Father Stăniloae once gave a lecture on the icon. The audience wrote it down on soap. Some wrote something, others something else, so that in the end they could put it all together. Then someone in their cell typed it out in Morse code and that’s how we all heard it. After that, when I read various theological studies, nowhere did I come across such a concise and essential exposition.

Father said that the Saint in the icon is the image of God, but an image of God that is not dark like ours, but bright. So when we venerate the Saint, we are really venerating the image of God in him. And whatever happens to the icon – if it burns, for example – the image of God in it remains intact. I don’t remember exactly, but it was extraordinary… Father didn’t just give religious talks. Once, talking about doctrine, he said that it was easier to convert communists than freethinkers, because at least they believed in the existence of matter, so they only had one step to take. Freethinkers, on the other hand, believe neither in matter nor in spirit. Here I disagreed with Father Stăniloae. You can’t convert the communists, because they are demoniacs. The others are also poor, of course. (…)

Father Stăniloae, without a doubt, he was a Saint.

(Pr. Gheorghe Calciu – The Life of Father Gheorghe Calciu according to his Testimonies and those of Others, Christiana Publishing House, Bucharest, 2007, pp. 68,78)