“I was deeply impressed by his piousness, his kindness of heart”

I, Sivoglo Neculai, teacher of Romanian language and literature at the Dofteana School, Dofteana commune, Bacău county, after the revolution of December 1989, bring to your attention the following injustice and persecution perpetrated by the dictatorship, which tragically affected the fate of a good man.

What is it about?

When I came to teach in the commune of Dofteana, I had the opportunity to meet the priest Alexandru Mazilu, who worked in the Orthodox parish of Dofteana. I was deeply impressed by his piety, his kindness of heart, his constant desire to help the needy in the parish, and I must point out that there are many of their kind in the parish.

He showed moderation and modesty in all the circumstances of his life. One could read in his nature a strong spiritual experience, a great joy when he succeeded in helping someone, after which he would fall back into a state of sadness, which he carried like an unhealed wound.

We later learned that the cause of this depression, a deep wound in his personality, was a dirty plot, an unfounded accusation, for which he was arrested without trial and held for years as a political prisoner in a prison in Dobrogea. My indignation, of which I have spoken to you, stems from the thought of how it is possible that a man like the priest Mazilu Alexandru, with an impressive moral character, who made great material efforts to raise and educate his three children, who often waived payment for services rendered to parishioners, could meet this fate.

How happy he was when, in the years after 1968, he attended the tribute to the village heroes at their monument in front of the town hall with tears of joy on his face!

He advised parents to send their children to school, seeing it as a way of giving them a future.

There are many good things to say about this church worker.

Even today, people remember Alexandru Mazilu with respect and gratitude, because he died in the autumn of 1978, with sorrow in his heart for the injustices and accusations against him, for the sufferings to which he was subjected.

I believe that justice must be done, and that is why I insist that the priest Alexandru Mazilu be rehabilitated, at least after his death, in order to ensure his peace of mind.

12 III 1990

Dofteana

Prof. M. Sivoglio

(Document published in Martyrdom of the Romanian Orthodox Church, Ramida Publishing House, 1994, p. 117 and in the magazine Vestitorul Ortodoxiei, year VI, no. 111 of 28 February 1994)