Father Victor Oțoiu – “he radiated from his whole being kindness and love that you could not resist”
A priest with the figure of a transfigured ascetic, taken from an ancient Byzantine icon, he radiated from his whole being a kindness and love that you could not resist; without wanting to, you approached him, spellbound. His resolute speech, with its regionalisms of the Transylvanian language, made you realise that you were in the presence of an unyielding fighter for truth and justice. The villagers respected and loved him, because he always gave them the best advice and material help, knowing their problems and pains. And the parishioners also knew that the priest had an eye of God that showed him every sin in the parish.
In front of the church stood a large and beautiful cherry tree. Every spring, after being decorated like a bride, it was laden with the enchanting gifts that the children coveted. Father would order them to climb the cherry tree and fill baskets for their parents and younger siblings.
One spring, Father saw a branch broken off and dragged down the path leading to the cemetery. It had broken off at dawn, the leaves not yet withered. The next day he found another broken branch. He decided to keep watch during the night to find the culprit. He waited on the porch of the church, hidden behind the pillar. He was tired after midnight; he was about to leave, thinking that dawn was approaching, when he heard the sound of footsteps. He strained to recognise the culprit. A hooded man with a bag and a hooked stick grabbed a branch full of cherries, tore it off and began to gather the cherries. The father slowly approached him from behind, grabbed his right hand and forced him to lie face down on the ground. The man began to scream like a snake:
– Ooooooy!… Ooooooy!…
The priest climbed onto his back with his knees. When he felt the man went limp due to the pain he was inflicting, he said:
– Well, tell me straight, are you in pain or not, why are you shouting like that?
– Forgive me, Father, forgive me, I won’t do it again!
– I didn’t ask you to tell me, just tell me if it hurts.
– Then how can it not hurt me, woe is me for my sins.
– Well, you see, I’m asking you now: What do you think it hurt the cherry tree when you broke its branches and tore off its bark? If I broke your hand and tore off your skin, what would you say? You wouldn’t say anything, because the cherry tree couldn’t complain. But you do. It suits you! Everyone saw the broken cherry tree. What if you saw yourself broken and skinned in front of the village?
After the rebuke, the priest loosened his grip and the man got up; he was the keeper of the fields.
– Would the people trust you to guard the fields?
The priest told no one. But the field keeper told his friends, and the whole village found out. And everyone knew that if you did something stupid and God didn’t see you, Father Victor Oțoiu would.
People said that in the autumn of 1944, when the Soviet troops were chasing the Germans towards Cluj and Turda, 10-12 Russians stormed the miller’s house, the brother-in-law of Fr. Oțoiu. 5-6 of them tried to break down the attic door where the miller’s wife and daughter had barricaded themselves. The others caught the miller and took the keys to the cellar. The miller’s son, a 13-14 year old schoolboy, ran scared across the pond. When he came to his father with his breath in his mouth, he said:
– Father, the Russians have come and…
Tired and excited, he fell down and fainted. The priestess held him:
– Leave the child with me and run there quickly!
The father thought: “What can I do alone? I don’t know how many Russians there are!” He went across the street to his brother-in-law Peter, a shrew of a man, and told him the story in two words. Uncle Peter gave a woodland call and twenty young men and boys gathered from the alleys, ready for battle. Father, at the head of the brave band, headed for the mill. Then they split up, some going to the bridge of the mill, where they banged on the door, and the others to the cellar, where they sang and played by the barrels.
The Russians had no time to realise that they had been disarmed and tied up. My father ordered a car to come and loaded them up like sacks and took them to the Soviet headquarters in Teiuș. The Russians begged them to let them go or they would be shot.
– If we had priests like that in Russia, Daddy wouldn’t support the communism!
Little did the poor people know that daddy Stalin was a tool in the hands of another occult power, striking on all fronts, seen and unseen, to bring the Christian world to its knees.
In Teiuș, the priest explained to the Soviet command what had happened and asked that the marauders not be executed. The commander was glad that the deserters had been caught, thanked the priest, but warned him:
– If it had been anyone else in my place, they would have executed you immediately.
Building the parish house in Mesentea
Father lived with his family in two small rooms he had built in the old woodshed of the village school. The priestess was also the teacher of the four primary classes of 5-6 children each.
We thought they deserved to live in a human house. The parishioners, the 60-70 families, contributed the materials and we contributed the labour. By autumn we had built a villa.
Father’s wife didn’t know how to thank God for getting rid of the cockroaches and frogs and for being more careful with us. Presbytera Maria Oțoiu could not enjoy the beautiful house for long, because Father Victor, like her son, also a priest, was to be arrested after 1950 and both were to serve in the Triumphant Church. She remained to comfort her daughter in her old age. (…)
(Virgil Maxim, Hymn for the Carried Cross. Abecedar duhovnicesc pentru un frate de cruce, 2nd edition, Antim Publishing House, Bucharest, 2002, pp. 157-159)