Memories of Metropolitan Bartholomew Ananias

The reluctance of knowing him

One day, of a particular year, I went to the Patriarchal Cathedral to worship the holy relics of St. Dimitrios the New. It was a day when the Holy Synod was in session. Metropolitan Bartholomew had come down from the Patriarchal Palace and was getting into his car. Several faithful went to receive his blessing, including me. It was the first time I had seen His Eminence Bartholomew Ananias up close, as they say.

– What a voice he has! He must be a very strong man, said a woman who had just received his blessing.

– But his face is also very rugged. I would be afraid to be around such a man for too long, added another.

– He may be tough, but he preaches your head off, interjected a third woman.

To be honest, I wasn’t too far from these women’s opinions either, but I refrained from commenting. At the time, I had great respect for Metropolitan Bartholomew, but I didn’t want to meet him. Why not? Because I felt some kind of fear that I didn’t understand. Later I realised that I was afraid of His Eminence’s greatness.

Many times I had the opportunity to read Metropolitan Bartholomew’s work and I didn’t (until one day). Countless times I passed books signed by Valeriu Ananias and did not have the curiosity to open them to read even a few pages. And this was because I had two negative influences: one personal and the other from my confessor. Whenever he spoke to me about His Eminence Bartholomew, he did not speak in glowing terms.

In the spring of 2004, I was due to finish my first book, Between the Heaven of Prayer and the Hell of Drugs. Although I only had a few proofs to do, I felt that I couldn’t do it anymore, that I didn’t have the strength to go on. I needed more peace. I couldn’t find peace anywhere but in a monastery. And since one of my favourite monasteries is Căldărușani, I asked Father Lavrentie Gâță to take me in for a few days, if possible, to finish the book I was working on. The abbot, understanding my need for peace and quiet, but also being a great lover of literature, agreed to host me for as long as was necessary to complete the work.

One day the Father Abbot told me about the time when His Eminence Bartholomew used to tell stories about various things, and those present would listen with rapt attention. He recalled that he used to come to the Căldărușani monastery when the Most Reverend Gherasim, was abbot, and he used to enjoy, among other things, the fish caught in the lake near the monastery. Listening to the abbot, who was very convincing in what he said, I began to see things from a different perspective.

At one point he asked me if I had read Metropolitan Bartholomew’s work. I said no and explained why.

Don’t judge by appearances! Father Abbot urged me. If you don’t read the work of His Eminence, you will lose a lot. You are very wrong when you say that such a hard man cannot write anything meaningful. If you read what the High One has written, you will see that underneath this mask of a hard man there is an extremely sensitive soul. I suggest you start by reading The Rotunda of the Burning Poplars, then Memories of the Pilgrim Apter, and then The Skies of Olt… he said, smiling.

– What are you going to do now, list all the books written by the High One?

– Ah, no. That’s just the beginning…

As promised, he brought me the Rotunda of the Burning Poplars from the library.

– It’s disturbing, this book, like the others. Instead, you’ll find a tragicomic sequence of great finesse. The story of Arghezi’s goats.

I leafed through the book and looked at the abbot, who had spoken with great admiration of the miracle that was Bartolomew Ananias.

– Father Abbot, if my obstinacy in reading the work of the High Priest was strengthened by the opinions of my confessor, it is Your Holiness who has removed that obstinacy. Now I am not only curious to see how he writes, but I want to know him better from what he has put down on paper. Incidentally, I once met His Holiness on Mitropolia Hill, and he inspired a kind of awe in me.

– And have you discovered why?

– No. Probably because he seems a hard man to me.

– No, he isn’t. When you read his work, you’ll see things differently. I, and others like me who looked at him from a distance, had the same impression as you. For example, I was in my fourth year at the Faculty of Theology in Bucharest and I lived in the priest’s dormitory. The High Priest was the director of the publishing house of the Orthodox Biblical and Missionary Institute. In the evenings I would see him come out of his chapel in civilian clothes and go out to meet his literati. My colleagues and I would look at him with a kind of awe and admiration. He was said to be an atypical monk, and even then a very special man. Those who knew him well were forever marked by his personality. When you get to know him, as I hope you will, you will realise that he is different from other people. He has something that others don’t have, and that is a genius.

I was looking at Father Abbot, listening to him, and a question began to form in my mind. Why had my confessor spoken to me in one way about Metropolitan Bartholomew and why had the Abbot spoken to me in another? I was to unravel this “mystery” later.

– Tell me more about the High Priest! I urged the abbot.

– There is much to tell. But to talk about such a powerful personality is a real challenge. Although we have served and sat at table together countless times, whenever I am asked to speak about His Highness, I do so with great reluctance. He is the most sincere man I have ever met. He spoke with great sincerity about subjects that we often avoid. And when that happens, inevitably, when you are there, you get a sense of frustration. A man like His Eminence may have many envious enemies, many more admirers who look at the pedestal he has reached and wonder: How? And friends? I have often wondered if His Eminence can have friends. And I have come to the conclusion that it is difficult for a man like him to find anyone like him.

– I smiled, somewhat knowingly, because I imagined that this might actually be the case.

– Why are you smiling?

– Why? Because good people don’t have many counterparts in the world we live in.

– Unfortunately, there is one.

After a moment’s silence, Father Abbot also smiled. It was my turn to ask him why.

Because I remembered something else the Abbot had said. It was a piece of advice: ‘Be careful what you say to a writer, because you might find yourself in his work.

– Is that a hint?

– No, he said, still smiling.

– If it’s not a hint, it’s a fact, Father Abbot.

The High Priest was right. 

Another Bartholomew

As soon as I started reading The Rotunda of the Burning Poplars, I was fascinated by the High Priest’s writing style. I was to discover another Bartholomew in his work.

The mask of the hard man was slowly falling away to make way for another face, full of sensitivity and all kinds of turmoil. The pendulum between the two worlds of monasticism and literacy often caused him emotional upheavals that simply exhausted him. […]

The incredible day

In 2004 I was about to publish my first book, Between the Heaven of Prayer and the Hell of Drugs, a book published with the blessing of His Grace Galaction Stângă, Bishop of Alexandria and Teleorman, for whom I have great respect. At the first meeting of the Holy Synod after the publication of the book, His Eminence gave the book, signed by me, to all the members of the Holy Synod. With this gesture, God was to arrange for me to meet Metropolitan Bartholomew, whom I would have liked to meet but did not dare to hope for.

I will never forget the incredible day when His Eminence Bartholomew called me. I remember it as if it was yesterday. I had just got home and my mobile phone rang. It was a number I didn’t recognise.

– God bless you! Mihaela Ion?

I immediately recognised the unmistakable baritone voice of Metropolitan Bartholomew. But I thought he had called me by mistake, or I didn’t know what to think…

– Yes, on the phone, I answered and remained in suspense.

– Archbishop Bartholomew of Cluj on the phone.

– May I have your blessing, Your Holiness, I said, thinking I was dreaming…

– Girl, I have the book you signed. I’ve read it and I want to tell you that you have a good eye. Congratulations. Don’t stop there, don’t let it be just a fashion to see your name on a book!

– Thank you for your appreciation. I can’t believe I can hear you, I can’t believe you called me… Your Highness’ words make me very happy, but they also make me feel responsible. I am at the beginning of my journey and I am sure I have a lot to learn. I assure you that writing is not a fashion for me, it is my greatest desire. I haven’t published anything because I was afraid. I worked in the press and all the time I thought I was training to fulfil my dream. And now I have a tightness in my heart, I don’t know if I did the right thing… I have a lot of doubts…

– That’s right, you still have a lot to learn, but you also have a lot of potential and desire from what I can see, and that will help you a lot. Every beginning is hard. Having doubts is not a bad thing. I know exactly what you mean because I’ve been there. One day I plucked up the courage, or perhaps it was desperation that urged me on, to write to Arghezi about my insecurities. He told me: “Doubts won’t leave you at eighty. That’s the best thing that can happen to a writer”. And he was right, you know.

A real writer always asks himself: Shouldn’t I have written more? Shouldn’t I have written something else? A real writer is always competing with himself.

– Thank you, Your Highness! I would have a lot to say, perhaps a lot to ask, but you have surprised me, because not even in my wildest dreams could I have hoped that you would call me. You have given me great joy, but you know, sometimes joy creates confusion. I’m very happy but confused. I don’t even know what to say to you first.

– Girl, I’ll be in Bucharest tomorrow. I’d like to meet you and talk to you in person. I’ll call you around noon, after the meeting of the Holy Synod.

I paused because I had the impression that I didn’t quite understand what I had heard. His Holiness Bartholomew wanted to meet me. INCREDIBLE.

– I am honoured by Your Highness’s invitation. I also wanted to say that I would like to meet you, but I thought it was too bold. Thank you very much, Your Highness, I look forward to seeing you. Thank you for everything!

– Then I’ll see you tomorrow, girl. Have a blessed evening.

– Amen. I kiss your hand, Your Highness.

– God help us, he said and hung up.

After a few minutes of looking at the phone, still unable to believe that Metropolitan Bartholomew had called me, I happily stored His Highness’s number in my phone’s memory. The first person I called to tell him about the dialogue was my confessor. After telling him who had called me and what we had talked about, I said that I was looking forward to meeting him because I really wanted to meet him.

– Don’t go anywhere, he said in a commanding tone.

– Why shouldn’t I go, Your Highness?

– Because he’s not a good man, he replied briefly.

– Very well, but I promised him we would meet. What am I going to tell him?

– You’ll call him tomorrow, before he calls you, and tell him that an unforeseen situation has arisen and that you have to leave Bucharest.

– But I’m embarrassed to tell him. Just think, it’s Metropolitan Bartholomew and the great writer Valerius Ananias.

– You will do obedience and won’t go, if you want to do obedience, of course.

– All right, I’ll do as you say, I said, after invoking the reason for obedience.

After the unexpected joy that Metropolitan Bartholomew had given me, came an equally unexpected sadness from my confessor, the man I trusted most. At that time I put obedience above all else, without considering the man in my confessor whom I saw as God’s messenger. The man who could have malice, who could be ruled by envy and complexes.

The next day I called Metropolitan Bartholomew, as my confessor had suggested, or rather ordered me to do. I apologised and expressed my regret that unforeseen circumstances had prevented us from meeting.

– That’s all right, child. Go and sort out your problems and I’ll see you another time.

– Thank you for your understanding. I kiss your hand, Your Highness.

After I had hung up the phone, sensing a kind of disbelief in Her Highness’s voice, I began to feel guilty. Firstly, because I had lied to him, and secondly, because I felt I had closed the one door I had never hoped would open for me. Fear gripped my soul. I called my confessor and told him that I had done exactly what he had told me to do, but that my soul was not at peace.

– You have nothing to regret. Now you’re sorry you didn’t fulfil a dream, but rest assured you did what you did very well, he tried to reassure me.

I took him at his word that he knew what he knew. From that moment on, I thought things were clear. I began to come to terms with the fact that I had missed the chance to meet a man of great value, but I was satisfied, if I may say so, that I had listened to the confessor who was supposed to be the voice of God.

One day, as I was shelving books in the library, I was leafing through Colleen McCullough’s The Spin Bird, which I had been reading for a long time. I stopped at a passage that is as sad as it is true: “Forgiveness comes from God, but the ears that listen are those of men. Then a question occurred to me: “What if my confessor, out of envy, forbade me to meet Metropolitan Bartholomew?”

In order to get an answer, I had to try to get in touch with Metropolitan Bartholomew to form a personal opinion. But I was afraid that Metropolitan Bartholomew would not return my calls. More than two or three months had passed since that incredible day when His Grace had called me. Although I was embarrassed to have refused the invitation to meet without the confessor’s knowledge, I called the great Valerius Bartholomew Ananias. To my surprise he answered.

– I kiss your hand, Your Eminence. I am Mihaela Ion. I don’t know if you remember me.

– God bless you! How could I not remember, girl? What are you doing? What are you working on?

– I’ve got more material.

– Good girl, good girl. That’s good to hear. When you finish these books, I hope you’ll send them to me.

– Of course, with all my love. Your Eminence, how are you?

– I manage to do some writing in addition to my duties.

– May God help you in all you do! I’m very sorry I couldn’t come to see you.

– I’m sorry too, but pray that God will make it possible for us to meet.

– I will. The next time you come to the Holy Synod meeting, if I don’t ask too much of you, I would like to try to meet you.

– Sure, if time permits, sure.

After I had finished my conversation with the High Priest, and an answer was flaring up to the question “What if my confessor, out of envy, forbade me to meet Metropolitan Bartholomew? The answer I feared.

Now, looking back, I realise that Metropolitan Bartholomew was right:

“Do not kill me, I cry a thousand times…
Oh, in the wilderness I may howl,
But I, fellow hunters, I know
“That a bird is not shot until it flies”.

Metropolitan Bartholomew’s “hunters” often tried to kill him in flight, and when the Lord decided to take him to Himself, those same “hunters” rushed to mourn his death. Why? Because it feels good to pretend to be close to, or even a friend of, a man of such value. It’s an image transfer. Isn’t it?

Other obstacles on the way to Metropolitan Bartholomew

After the telephone conversation with Metropolitan Bartholomew, I felt better on the one hand because I had managed to arrange another meeting, at least in principle, but on the other hand I was terrified that I would have to lie to my confessor. What began to bother me more and more was the fact that I felt that a rift had already developed between me and my first confessor, whom I had trusted the most. I became more and more reserved. He often asked myself why I was so quiet? I always answered that I was tired. Until one day when I told him that I was sorry I had missed the only opportunity to meet His Eminence Bartholomew, hoping that he would be a little more malleable and I could tell him that I had called.

– Don’t worry. You have nothing to regret, you’ve lost nothing.

After such an answer, I realised that there was no point in broaching the subject. Other questions began to rage in my soul: “Is it only out of envy that he is doing this, or does he not care about me, what I feel, what I want? What am I doing now, obeying, or have I somehow entered into slavery disguised as obedience? God does not limit man’s freedom of choice, so why does my confessor? Why doesn’t he let me see for myself whether High Bartholomew is a man of quality or not?

After such anxiety, I realised that confession could derail from it’s intended purpose that would not help me at all. Then, on the grounds that distance prevented me from going to confession more often or whenever I felt the need, I asked for his blessing to find another confessor.

– We’ll talk about it when I come to Bucharest.

– When are you coming? I asked impatiently.

– In a few days. I’ll let you know the day before, and then you’ll confess to me.

When he came to Bucharest, I went to confession, formally of course, and then I reminded him that I wanted him to give me a dispensation to confess elsewhere.

– Of course I will give you a blessing, but you will also confess to me every two or three months.

I accepted the proposal, although I was sure it would be my last confession to the confessor I had loved so much and still loved. And so it was.

Whenever he asked me if I wanted to go to confession, I told him that I didn’t really want to, because I was very happy with the new confessor, but that I could go to him if he wanted.

– If you’re happy with your confessor, there’s no point.

And yes, unfortunately it was pointless. When I met him, I hoped he would remain my confessor forever, but time was to teach me a painful lesson.

I began to speak with His Eminence Bartholomew more and more often, which I was very happy about. I felt that Metropolitan Bartholomew was getting closer and closer to me. There were times when, after hanging up the phone, I would call him again after a few minutes because I had so much to say and so much to learn, but I didn’t call him, I was content to recite from His Eminence’s works or listen to his sermons. Sometimes, when I called him and he felt tired, I would exchange a few sentences and tell him that I was glad to hear him. That was my way of protecting him. […]

Although we didn’t manage to see each other in person, we communicated very often by telephone and sometimes by e-mail. One day he called me and said:

– What are you doing, little girl? (A question I miss very much!)

– Thank you for asking, Your Eminence, now that you’ve called me, I’m very happy to hear from you.

– Anything else? Asked.

– I’ve been selecting, actually throwing out some notes, some material I’ve been working on.

– You mean you’ve finished a book and you’re throwing away notes?

– Yes.

– You’re doing a very bad thing. The rubbish that you think is useless is not useless at all. You need to throw away certain notes or things, but not everything. Don’t forget that every thing has a certain charge, a certain energy that can help you or be a witness to an event. For example, one of the things I keep is a pair of my own shoes that my tormentors put on my feet after beating the shit out of me. After putting the shoes on my already swollen feet, they would beat me with iron fangs to make the pain even worse. I could feel the blows as they went down my spine and stopped at the top of my head. This happened in one of the prisons, during an investigation where I was forced to admit things I had not done and had never even heard of. These shoes with the scuffed soles are no good. But I have kept them because they are a testimony to my suffering.

– Your Holiness, how could you endure such torment?

– I have endured for my sins…

– How could you look at those executioners who tortured you without mercy?

– I looked at them with pity. And every time I came out, or most of the time when I was brought crawling back to my cell from the torture chamber, so that hatred would not fester in my soul, I prayed for them.

– You prayed for them?

– Yes, I prayed for them. I put the blanket over my head and prayed.

– How could you put the blanket over your head and pray for those who beat you so cruelly?

– With sincerity, he answered me serenely.

In fact, His Eminence could do nothing but be sincere. With sincerity he lived, wrote, prayed and served. Compromise, for His Eminence, was the equivalent of hell.

After that conversation, it took me a long time to unravel certain things. For example, I did not understand how a somewhat stern face and a thunderous voice could hide such a sensitive soul. He had an incredible inner strength and self-control that I have rarely encountered. When he spoke of his years of imprisonment, I could feel his soul trembling as he relived the pain he had endured and the joy he had been given through the miracle of forgiveness. The dialogue I had with His Highness had not only made me think more deeply about this “mechanism” called man, but I had also learnt from His Highness something very important, namely that I must keep the materials I work with as witnesses of the time I am going through, or we are going through.

The bond between me and His Holiness, I can say, had become very special, and yet I had one great regret, and that was that for a while we could not see each other because of the obstacles that kept coming up. Sometimes the meetings of the Holy Synod were prolonged, sometimes something came up in His Highness’s schedule, sometimes I was not in Bucharest. But God had ordained a time when we would meet, not only in Bucharest, but even in Cluj.

With pain in my heart, but with a smile on my lips

One day I called him and told him, among other things, that I was very sad, that sometimes I felt too lonely.

– Make loneliness your friend and sadness your ally, he told me.

– Sadness and loneliness can be creative if you control them, but if they control you, they become destructive. Don’t expect anything from people! Learn to live alone and turn to God when you feel that loneliness is getting you down. Friends are very rare nowadays, I would even say non-existent. If you are given a true friend, keep him, if not, stop looking for him! And I say if you are given one, because I consider a friend to be a gift from God that you receive or not. It’s worse if you get them and don’t know how to keep them. Often it’s good to try to put a smile in the place of your sadness or the sadness of others.

For example, in Jilava prison (Fort 13 Jilava), where you didn’t know when it was day or night because the ceiling was at the grass level, a doctor was brought in one day. When the man saw himself there, in such conditions, he became agitated. He paced like a caged lion. He repeated and repeated: “I don’t know what I’m looking for here, what I’m looking for here…”. His mental state deteriorated from one moment to the next, he was on the verge of depression. Seeing him like that, although I can’t say I was too happy either, I said to him, “You’re wrong, dear sir, you belong right here”. Outraged, he asked me why I said that? How do I know that’s where he belongs? “How do I know? I know very well that you belong here. Have you forgotten that where the sun doesn’t shine, the doctor enters?” And because he hadn’t expected such an answer, he laughed and then calmed down.

– He realised that you were right in a way, I said smiling, and began to feel useful. If it wasn’t sunny out there, at least it was him.

– A saying, said with a smile, was welcome to get a man out of depression, or at least to make him accept the situation.

Later, in an interview, the High Priest would elaborate further on the subject of sadness: “Sadness is not only a disease of the soul, it can also be a badge of existence. In one of my verses I asserted ‘the nobility of being alone and the right to be sad’, which would mean that presumed loneliness coexists with creative sadness, while presumed sadness is at home with noble loneliness.

Of course, the existence of a goal in life can be a cure for sadness as a disease, except that the road to the final goal is long, sometimes very long, and fragmented into intermediate goals, each with its own obstacles, like a relay race with a single runner. The sadness caused by failure can be compensated by the next victory.

But if, like Peter, running with his feet on the sea, he takes his eyes off the final goal for a single moment and looks down at the swirling waves of the contingent, he is in danger of drowning”.

In my moments of loneliness and sadness, sometimes when I could not talk to the High Priest for various reasons (either it was a late hour, or it was too early and I did not want to disturb him, or it was an hour when he could rest), I would listen to his sermons. […]

Shortly after listening to the sermon, the High Priest called me.

– God help us! What are you doing, girl?

– Kissing your hand, Your Highness. Coincidence or not, I’ve just heard a sermon by Your Holiness.

– You have, have you?

– Yes, I did. Often, when I feel too lonely, I listen to the sermon of a man who knows loneliness and suffering.

– I’m glad you listen to my sermons.

– I’ve been listening for a long time, Your Holiness. I told you now because you asked me what I was doing, and I had just been listening to a sermon.

– And what did you hear?

– A sermon about loneliness. You talked about your own experience, but also about Nicolae Secăreanu and Olga Tudorache.

– Great names, but sadly forgotten. And they’re not the only ones.

– Your Eminence, I have often wondered if man’s destiny is to be alone.

– No, it should not be, but man chooses it, or is forced to choose it.

– Forced, yes. Good point. For example, I have no one to talk to except Your Holiness. I have only one friend, or rather I thought he was my friend, and not only does he hurt me very badly, but he also takes advantage of my sincerity and my feelings. And if he does this, who has known me for a very long time and whom I trusted so much, how can I have the courage to get close to someone else? In this case, I am forced to choose loneliness.

– Girl, don’t forget one thing. Loneliness is indeed oppressive and the source of much suffering, but art is born of suffering, not of joy. If you were happy, you couldn’t write.

– Is that really so?

– I am telling you for sure. For a man of art, loneliness is a blessing, provided it doesn’t take him down.

– And yet… sometimes I wish I were happy.

– Happiness is relative in this world. I wish, and I wish for you, to know eternal happiness.

– Amen! I said and sighed.

– Why are you sighing?

– I don’t know. It was an unpredictable reaction. A subconscious reaction, perhaps. Your Holiness, have you ever felt your loneliness suffocate you?

– Hm! Yes, I’ve had such an experience, he replied after a moment of silence.

– And what did you do in those moments?

– Anything else but despaired. If I could, I prayed. If not, I read, wrote, listened to music, walked… Loneliness has moments when it seems to attack you. If you don’t fight it, it calms its rage and becomes your ally.

– Yes, but there are people who have become depressed or, even worse, suicidal because of loneliness.

– People who go to such extremes are either too weak or too proud. Weak because they do not have the courage to fight against the hardships of life, or proud because they do not accept a reality other than the one they want.

– Or too sensitive?

– No. True sensitivity turns into art, it doesn’t run away into a world of depression or, even worse, as you said, suicide.

– Interesting.

– Yes, yes, I know what you mean.

– Your Holiness…

– Girl, true sensitivity has a power of its own, undefined and unbounded. A sensitive man may feel misunderstood, lonely, abandoned, but never defeated. When he feels that he can no longer go on, when he feels that loneliness is suffocating him, as you said, the power of sensitivity gives birth to the grain of a work, often great. Once this seed is born, it makes the sensitive man reborn, perhaps even like the phoenix, from his own ashes.

– I listened attentively and said nothing.

– Why are you silent?

– Hm! I don’t think I need to give you an answer to such a question.

– There is no need. It was a rhetorical question.

– Thank you for everything, Your Holiness.

– Not at all. I told you these things because I know you can understand them and that you need them.

– Thank you very much. I really did need them.

Every time I have spoken to the High Priest, so many times, I have felt my soul being nourished by an immeasurable richness. I’ve never tried to imagine what my life would be like without the His Eminence… Unfortunately, I was to find out and feel this unexpectedly soon.

Memories of prison

In 2007, around the Christmas holidays, I was working hard on a magazine for prisoners. One evening I received a call from the High Priest:

– What are you doing, girl?

– I’m working, I’m working, Your Holiness. My fingers are sore from typing.

– What’s the hurry?

– I’m writing a book for the inmates and I’m in a hurry to finish it because I want them to have it for Christmas.

– What’s it called?

– With Christ Behind Bars.

– Hey! Congratulations. Send it to me.

– I’m not going to send it to you because it’s a booklet that I’m writing with a pen because I don’t have time to go through it again. I’m sending you the large version because I’m also publishing a book for the general public.

– Never mind, never mind. You send me the booklet first and then the book.

– Fine, as you wish, but again, it’s written in a hurry.

– It doesn’t matter. I’ll let you write it to make the prisoners happy.

In two days and one night I finished the pamphlet. I published it and, after giving it to the prisoners, I sent some copies to Metropolitan Bartholomew.

As the package was sent between Christmas and New Year, it arrived a little late. After receiving the books and reading them, the Metropolitan sent me the following email:

“Yesterday I received the book in Cluj, in its few copies, and last night I read it here, in one breath, discovering in it a prose writer of talent, discernment, narrative nerve and noble purpose.

There was a time, during the war, when I sat with the “shutzii” in Jilava, as well as with some people condemned to death for robbery in disguise. But I spent most of my time in prison as a political prisoner, along with hundreds and thousands of my comrades, and I did not know the inner world of ordinary prisoners, which was very different from that of political prisoners, who had accepted their suffering and did not judge anyone, while God was their daily food. Here, in your book, I appreciated the art of introducing God with great methodical finesse, one slow step at a time, until He was decisively established in the consciousness of the condemned.

Congratulations is an understatement. I look forward to reading the “big” version. Best wishes for the New Year!

The years of imprisonment marked him for the rest of his life. He didn’t let on, and when he did talk about the trauma, it was rarely in a whisper. Many times, when he told me about the unimaginable ordeal he had been through, I couldn’t help but ask him how he had endured it.

– God strengthened me. I could tell He had a plan for me.

For Metropolitan Bartholomew, Cluj was a place of falling and rising, of painful but also very deep memories. He was a student in Cluj, arrested and expelled from Cluj, but as a reward, because God, as we know, is never in debt, on 21 January 1993 he was elected Archbishop of Vad, Feleac and Cluj. On the 7th of February, he was installed as Archbishop in the place where he had suffered so much from a very young age.

One evening, during an hour of silence, when he was recounting the life of His Eminence in such a different way, I asked him:

– Did you ever think that you would end up shepherding in the place from which you were exiled?

– No, I didn’t. Even less so because I never wanted greatness. If I had a bed to rest on and a desk to write on, that was enough for me. In fact, when I was proposed for the archbishopric of Cluj, not only did I not accept, I did not even apply. I was elected ex officio, after having been warned by His Eminence Daniel, Metropolitan of Moldavia [the current Patriarch n.n.], that the Synod and the College would elect me anyway, leaving my responsibility to God and history. And they elected me. So I obeyed, understanding that the Church was recalling its old host under the flag. (Later, in his memoirs, I would find the last chapter with this very title: The Old Shepherd, Recalled Under the Flag).

– What is Cluj like for Your Holiness now, compared to the one you left behind when you were arrested?

– Now Cluj has something extra for me – memories, he said, looking into my eyes.

His Holiness’s face, though he smiled faintly, showed a great deal of pain.

I looked at him carefully. I tried to capture every movement of his soul. After a moment of silence, he added:

– And now, after so many years, when I pass through the places where I was arrested, I see myself surrounded by gendarms. I don’t make a gesture. I don’t say anything, I just wait for the memory to fade.

After this confession, tears came to my eyes. “I just wait for the memory to fade. Fade, until a new encounter with the places that would revive it. And yet, day after day, year after year, the soul kept deep inside traumas that wouldn’t go away. […]

Metropolitan Bartholomew and many others paid with their youth and even their lives to preserve the integrity and faith of this nation. And what about us? What are we doing? How do we defend the values and the faith of our nation? How do we preserve the memory of those who sacrificed for us? What are we doing for our country? I am afraid that everything will be sold, everything will be bought, everything will be forgotten… If we sell out and bury our past, we will have no future. And what will our children’s children do? They will be strangers in their own country, which they will not be able to remember.

Always firm, always dignified

“My dears, throughout my life I have had only one prayer. My life, at least the first three quarters of it, has been very troubled, and not once, not twice, not three times have I felt close to death because of the sufferings and dangers I have gone through. I never cried out for death, but neither did I fear it. I had only one prayer to God: “Lord, if You think that You can still do something with me, and if You think that I can still be of use to my Church, to my nation and to my fellow human beings, then You will save me, You will let me live, and You will not let me be killed, neither by hunger, nor by thirst, nor by cold, nor by the blows of men, nor by the teeth of wolves. When You think that I am no longer of any use to You, then You will call me to Yourself, and I will see what You will do with me. But if You think that I am of any use, You will let me live, because I know that the Christian religion is eminently pragmatic”.

Yes, Metropolitan Bartholomew was never afraid of anything. And how can you be afraid when you know, when you believe, that your life is in God’s hands and that He gives man what is necessary for his soul? From this strong faith came the strength of High Priest Bartholomew. If he could change something for the better, he changed; if there were too many who opposed him, he withdrew, taking on labels such as intolerant, conservative, fundamentalist, retrograde.

Father Arsenie Papacioc of the Techirghiol Monastery, the great confessor of the Romanians, said: “…I confess Bartholomew Ananias, and he is one of those who still hold the truth and do not give in. I also confess other hierarchs, and if they don’t do what I have told them, and don’t keep the truth to the end, I will start drifting apart from them. No one followed Christ either, but he prevailed. So Ananias also “prevailed”.

If he did not always win in the eyes of men, he won in the eyes of God because he did not give in to evil, injustice and compromise.

Before one of the sessions of the Holy Synod, where a serious matter was to be discussed, a departure from the right faith that should also have been sanctioned, he called me.

– Your Eminence, I am glad to hear from you! How are you?

– What can I do, little girl? I’m going to fight.

– Yes, I think you will have a very hard fight, I said.

– I’m used to it, it doesn’t frighten me, it makes me sad, because I see that I’ll be alone on the battlefield, even if there are others who think like me, who don’t have the courage to speak out or to support me.

– You have another option. Give up.

– Me? Give in to evil, to please people or to be accepted as one of them? Never, never. Better isolated from men and close to God than close to men and far from God.

And Metropolitan Bartholomew’s premonition came true. At that meeting he was left alone ‘on the battlefield’. At one point I gave him a message saying that I hoped he would not be too upset if he failed. After a while he called me back.

– Thank you for your concern! Just to make sure I didn’t get too upset, I had already gone home.

– How come? I asked him in surprise. Shouldn’t you still be in Bucharest?

– Yes, I should be, but I’m not. It was as I had suspected, and in a case like this there was no point in stopping anyone else from having dinner. So I left,” he said with bitterness in his voice.

When the meeting was over, I got into the car and drove away. I listened to Beethoven on my headphones all the way home. Sometimes it’s better with the dead than with the living.

In addition to being always firm and always dignified, he was a man of rare common sense. The journey from Cluj to Bucharest was quite long. So as not to disturb his companion and not to force him to listen to music he might not understand, he had a CD player and listened to music on headphones, although he could just as easily have listened to it on the car’s CD player.

He never complained about anything. Often, because of his age and accumulated suffering, he was not well. I could tell from his voice and sometimes I would ask him how he was feeling.

– A colleague of mine, when asked how he was, replied with a smile: “Mediocre, which is very good for my age”.

Another time, when I called him, he was in hospital.

– But what happened to you, Your Eminence?

– Nothing to worry about. I have a cold in my lungs.

– And how do you feel now?

– I’m fine. I wasn’t sick when they brought me in, but they had to run some tests. Anyway, I’m not just sitting here, I’m still working. I’ll be back home soon and I’ll take better care of myself.

– Well, you should!

– I should, but sometimes I’m careless.

No conversation with Metropolitan Bartholomew could be depressing. Although he had suffered all his life, he was a positive character who knew how to hold his head high in any situation. But when physical pain overwhelmed him, lest he complain and the caller feel his pain, he’d hang up. When he was feeling down, he would only answer emails. I’d learnt that lesson: if the phone was off, either he had no signal or he wasn’t feeling well, and then I’d email him. And he always replied. It was only when his illness took him down the road to eternal life that he stopped replying. […]

– Your Eminence, sometimes I feel that you are not well, although you tell me that you are well, I once told him.

– I have realised this, but out of habit I give the same answer. It is not a lie because, as I told you, I am quite well for my age. I’m not a Pharisee to say this, but throughout my life I’ve learned to either protect those around me or spare them from my problems. Those I feel close to I protect, others I spare both my problems and the obligation to be formal.

– Yes, you’re right, many people ask formal questions they’re not interested in the answers to. I have often felt this way, and still do, although I pretend not to understand the nature of the question. The hypocrisy of people really irritates me.

– It shouldn’t irritate you, it just frees you from the obligation to display a formal demeanour.

– I often listen to you and wonder where you get so much patience from.

– I’ve had it all my life. I have learned to use the weapons of patience and forgiveness. Without these weapons I would have been foolish, to say the least. An extra burden for psychiatrists. In the face of patience and forgiveness, everything fades and slowly settles on the ground. Patience and forgiveness help a person to reach old age morally untainted. Many fear physical decay, I have always feared moral decay. I want to be able to stand in front of people with my forehead to the sky, not with my chin to my chest. I don’t want to be vulnerable in any way, or worse, blackmailed. As a human being, I know how to be humble when it comes to myself, but when it comes to God, to the true faith, I cannot be humble for the sake of heretical habits. I cannot bow my head to them, I bow my head only to God.

And so it was from the beginning to the end.

“A tree is known by its fruit and a man by his deeds. It is not a merit to live long, at least not if you have the ambition to somehow get into the record books. The important thing is to live well, and for that you need an education from your parents, which I had. That’s why, on my birthday, the first thing I pray for in the intimate morning prayer is for my parents, who gave me life, but not just life, that wouldn’t be much, because they gave me an education. From my father, who was a man of wisdom, I learned never to take anything for granted, and from my mother, who was a treasure trove of folklore, I learned faith in God, fear and love of Him, respect for my own dignity, work and respect for the dignity of others. My mother used to tell us children a saying that she had inherited from her ancestors: Rather than lie in butter and look at the ground, I’d rather lie in salt and look at the sun. If someone asked me: “What did you learn from your mother?”, I would answer: “This is what I learned: to look at the sun. And if God grants me this light beyond the grave, I will be truly happy”.

The fruits of Metropolitan Bartholomew are many. He bore fruit in life and continues to bear fruit after his departure to eternal life. His words, his exhortations, his teachings have remained to bear rich fruit for those who listen to them and especially through those who were close to him. Metropolitan Bartholomew was and will remain like an everlasting fruitful tree that draws its sap from heaven.

On the mysteries of writing

One evening Metropolitan Bartholomew called me and asked me, as usual, how I was writing.

– I write and I write, Your Eminence. Sometimes I even write at night in my dreams, I told him. I wake up and write down fragments of what I ‘write’ in my sleep.

– Oh, that’s very good. Your brain is working and working.

– Sometimes I’m surprised because I just wake up and write down either the continuation of something I’m working on or certain parts of a future book I know I have to write.

– This is a very good exercise, especially because it happens involuntarily. In my years in prison, not having the opportunity to write on paper, I began to write in my memory.

– I have often wondered how this is possible.

– With hard work and perseverance it is possible. For years I trained my memory to listen to me. I told it to keep what I wanted and to throw away the junk. The difficult operation was not to give my brain a slate on which to “write”, but to “erase” the useless variants, because the first ones tend to remain and do not easily give way to new or definitive ones. The effort was considerable, but so was the satisfaction. Although I started with simple things, short verses, paired rhymes, after six years of working day in and day out, I came out with two finished plays and a lot of poems in my memory. In all, there were twelve thousand lines of verse.

Investigators, guards and colleagues saw me constantly preoccupied and suspected that I was preoccupied with all sorts of thoughts, but the truth was different. From the moment I felt that I could work, and that day by day more and more verses were being stored in my memory in final form, in my inner universe, I experienced the unspeakable joys of creation. If they could physically imprison me, my thoughts were free and so was my soul. I felt fulfilled with each verse I managed to birth and grow in my memory.

– I listen to you and remain amazed.

– Why is that? Have you seen how your brain does this involuntarily?

– Your Eminence, if I woke up and didn’t immediately write down what I ‘wrote’ in my dream, I would certainly forget it in the morning.

– With diligent practice, you would not forget.

– No, no matter how much I practised, I’d still forget. I would never be able to ‘write’ in my mind and retain thousands of lines.

For me, now as then, the way in which I ‘write’ verses in my mind and retain the final version remains a great mystery, a gift from God that I have never heard of anyone receiving. I understand the mechanism, but I will never be able to put it into practice. It was not the explanation itself that amazed me most, but the modesty of the High. “Did you see your brain doing that thing involuntarily?” he said, knowing how hard it had been to achieve such a feat, but telling me that I did it too, but effortlessly.

One evening I told Metropolitan Bartholomew about the incident at Eminescu’s tomb.

– Your Eminence, sometimes things happen to me that I can’t talk about because either I wouldn’t be understood or all sorts of interpretations would be made.

– You are right. I am. All sorts of things have happened to me over the years that may seem strange, if not non-existent, to say the least. And since you mentioned Eminescu, let me tell you about my own experience with the genius of our nation. I was in the Văratec monastery working on the Bible. After a hard day of reading and translating many versions, I went to bed to rest.

It was night. It was quiet and I was very tired. Although I was exhausted, I couldn’t sleep. My mind and soul were on hold. I had a feeling that something was going to happen, but I didn’t know what. At one point I heard a kind of warning roar coming from somewhere very far away. It was like a feeling, like a message. Slowly, slowly, verses began to take shape in my mind, a hymn in fact, with the cadence of an akathist, a hymn that I knew had to be dedicated to Eminescu. Although I was very tired, I got out of bed, sat down at my desk and began to write, verse after verse, as if someone was dictating to me. I wrote as if following a dictation. That night I wrote the Hymn of Eminescu. When I read it the next day, I was also surprised at what I had written. So I understand these things quite well.

– Your Eminence, maybe sometimes we are really dictated what to write, because I often get that impression myself.

– I think so too, and I also think that if we had the eyes of our soul wide open, we would be able to see many things.

– You are right. Although I’ve always wanted to write, I think writing has its own secrets. For example, sometimes I find it very hard to let go of a chapter of a book or a character. Even though I have it sketched out in my head, I procrastinate putting it down on paper. And when I have no choice but to write it, because I have to, when I’m done I feel exhausted and often a certain sadness.

– It happens to me too, and I have found an explanation that I think is real. Books are like our children. And just as in a family, children belong to their parents and grandparents until they go their own way, so books, in the process of being published, belong to the one who writes them. Children, when they grow up, belong to their partners and their own children, and parents and grandparents feel the sadness of parting. So it is with books. When they grow up and go to print, they no longer belong to the author, but to the public. It’s as if your child has left home, and although you’re proud that it’s yours, you miss it…

– That’s a pretty good explanation. I think you’re right.

– And I also think that in life we meet certain people, even if only briefly, to become characters. We have certain feelings to describe certain states, we encounter situations to become the “scenery” of some writings.

– Interestingly, I’ve never thought about this, although intuitively I’ve sometimes felt the same way.

– I’ve thought about it because I’m older than you, much older, he said, smiling.

– Artists never grow old. They stay young by what they do… and immortal. And Your Holiness, you are not just an artist, you are a true artist.

– I believe that man never grows old. The truth is that some of those who are gifted by God also leave the testimony of their youth and immortality, as you said. I’ve had a long time to count my years… …and although the signs of time have appeared on my body, my soul has remained the same… I remember when I first saw white hair, I used to look in the mirror and wonder why. It seemed unfair…and yet, with time, I began to get used to myself and my body aging. I believe that human beings have a maturity that is often imposed from the outside, a behaviour that must be compatible with biological age…

– In the company of his peers, but in solitude he can be as he feels, or in the presence of a friend, but a true friend…

– Yes, that’s right. And the part about the true friend, nice, but hard to make, or rather hard to find… And true, he said, smiling, after a long pause.

– We talked a lot, about a lot, when we were proofreading the memoirs. Many times I told him that I couldn’t wait any longer, that I couldn’t wait to read it. The High Priest would smile and say:

– Patience… patience is one of the greatest virtues.

And in the end I was patient because I had no choice. And the long-awaited day came. His Eminence called me and told me that he had sent the book by post and that I would receive it in the next few days. I was very happy and thanked him very much. Indeed, a few days later I received the book in a white, shockproof envelope with the letterhead “Office of the Metropolitan”. I eagerly opened the envelope, and on the second page of the book there was another surprise waiting for me: for Mihaela Ion, with my best wishes. Valeriu Anania. Nov. 2008″. For me, the book of Metropolitan Bartholomew’s memories, with a dedication, was a gift of great value. I called him, thanked him from the bottom of my heart and told him that I would start reading it as soon as we had finished talking.

– I’m waiting for your opinion, he said with a smile.

– Ah, the feedback can only be excellent, apart from the inevitable “impressive”.

And as promised, I didn’t put the book down until I’d read it. Then I phoned Metropolitan Bartholomew:

– Your Grace, I have now finished the book. Truly, from agony to ecstasy. And smiles and tears. I would like to describe the book of memoirs in some way, but I can’t find the right words. I do, however, have one thing to say. There are many things you have not written, I said, and I began to list them.

– Well,” he said, smiling, “someone else will write them after me!

Even though Metropolitan Bartholomew told me this, I do not consider myself the author of the continuation of His Eminence Bartholomew’s memoirs. There are people who were much closer to Metropolitan Bartholomew and who can write many more things and memories, but I feel that I have a moral duty towards the High Prelate because I knew him, because he accepted me at his side and because he taught me many things. […]

A true monk

Those who did not know Metropolitan Bartholomew, or who did not want to know him, used to say that His Eminence was an atypical monk. It seemed so from the sidelines, but it was not the truth. Those who rushed to label him as such forgot that Metropolitan Bartholomew was not only a monk, but also had the soul of an artist. And the artist always feels differently. His soul is tuned to other coordinates than the usual ones. For a man with the soul of an artist, and a monk on top of that, the struggle is unimaginably great.

Although he was said to be an atypical monk, Metropolitan Bartholomew knew how to be a true monk, sacrificing himself for the good of the Church and his fellow men. In one of his sermons he said: “When it is a question of humbling yourself for yourself, you cannot humble yourself – keep your dignity, but when it is a question of humbling yourself for the good of others, humble yourself! I sometimes find myself in this situation. I am a dignitary of the Church, an Archbishop, a respected man to whom doors are opened, to make a few phone calls… but sometimes I find myself in the office of a Minister who has arranged an audience for me at a certain time to ask him for support for the Cathedral… and sometimes it happens that my secretary tells me: “Please sit down, Your Eminence:

– Please sit down, Your Eminence, someone has already come in and the minister is busy with him.

Dignity would oblige me to leave immediately, because it is not allowed for an Archbishop to make an antechamber at the door of a Head of State, but no – I sat down:

– Thank you. I’ll wait, miss.

And I waited for the Minister to see me and solve my problem. I said: ‘I’m not asking for myself, I’m asking for the Church I serve. Or I go to ask for help for orphans or widows or old people’s homes, I always make it clear that if I am not received, respecting my ecclesiastical dignity, at least what I have, I will humble myself for the sake of others”.

And not only did he humble himself for the sake of others, he gave up a lot. After the death of His Eminence’s brother, whom he loved very much and who was the only family member he had left, he made a decision that surprised me.

– I put my brother’s studio up for sale. A real estate agency handles the selling process.

– Why don’t you keep it, Your Eminence? Perhaps you’ll still come to Bucharest and want to retire somewhere quiet and private.

– I’m a monk. What use is it to me? I have more than enough. I never dreamed I would have so much. And then I want to set up the Bartholomew Foundation to help young people who have no chance. At least some of them won’t have to endure the humiliation I’ve endured. I want to spare at least some of them the moments I went through, like having to steal a pair of trousers. And I wrote about that in my memoirs.

– Yes, very sad indeed. When you told me about it, it brought tears to my eyes.

After a while, he happily told me that the estate agent he had entrusted with the sale of the studio had not only sold it, but had got an unexpectedly good price.

– I am very happy about this success. I can finally set up the foundation I have always dreamed of. The money I had wasn’t enough. I had fulfilled another dream. Thank God!

I rarely saw and felt Metropolitan Bartholomew happy. But when he heard that he could set up the “ATTENTION” Foundation to help others, he was truly happy.

– Your Holiness, you didn’t have to sell your studio, the money you took for the Bible was enough, I told him with a smile. After 11 years of working almost every day, you had to take a lot of money.

I made this remark because we had once discussed what it meant to work so hard on translating the Bible and the benefits it brought.

– You’re a clever girl, how come I didn’t think of that,” the Metropolitan replied with a smile.

– Well, when you’ve sold the studio, you’ll keep the money you got for the Bible in your account.

– Sure, I will.

Metropolitan Bartholomew worked alone on the new Bible translation for 11 years. A titanic task for which he asked for nothing valuable but only symbolic. But he will receive his true reward in heaven. At the suggestion of Professor Dumitru Fecioru, after endlessly insisting on working together on the new translation of the Bible, the professor, who had tearfully persuaded Metropolitan Bartholomew to accept the proposal, went to God. When he left this world, Father Dumitru Fecioru had the opportunity to work on the New Testament. Of the two who had promised to work for free on the new translation of the Bible, one had left. The promise had to be kept.

In these circumstances, the burden fell on Metropolitan Bartholomew’s shoulders. It took the Archbishop a year and a half to gather the materials needed for the best possible translation: Greek editions of the Septuagint and the New Testament, translation manuals published by the United Bible Societies, the twelve massive volumes of the monumental The Interpreter’s Bible, and much more. Because he had no way of checking the manuscript against the typescript, as he needed another person, he read the original aloud, while recording himself on cassette tapes. He would then listen to the original through headphones and look at the typed text, correcting it if necessary. As a result of Metropolitan Bartholomew’s incredible efforts, the manuscripts of the Nicula Monastery contain not only a Bible adapted to the evolution of the Romanian language, but also the manuscript of the Bible. The original manuscript consists of 14 volumes and 102 audio cassettes, transcribed on 22 CDs.

When he told me he had asked for a lion’s worth of royalties for the Bible, I thought he was joking.

– Like a lion (romanian currency), Your Eminence?

– Simple. A lion, because you wouldn’t want me to give it away for nothing, he said, smiling.

– Well, it’s either a lion or nothing, it’s all the same.

– How can it be the same? I didn’t stop until I got the lion.

– Is this another joke or what?

– It’s not a joke. I didn’t stop until I got the lion as royalty. I have it in my residence in Nicula, with the handing over and receiving protocol, with everything.

At the time, I didn’t really understand the point of asking for a lion as royalty. Later I realised that he had done very well. Considering how many small-minded penny-pinchers had thrown stones at High Bartholomew in his lifetime, the same or similarly frustrated others might have said that he had got rich translating the Bible. As long as there are accounting records which clearly show that Metropolitan Bartholomew received a lion’s share of the royalties for translating the Bible, no one can say anything. The monk, the true monk Bartholomew, translated the Bible for Christ, for the Church, for his people.

For those who do not understand his character and attitude, I would like to mention that Metropolitan Bartholomew did not display extravagance in his faith, but truly believed. Not once was he caught lingering before the Holy Altar. Not even those who served with His Eminence could understand why he did this. But in His economy, God made it known on one particular occasion why Metropolitan Bartholomew lingered before the Holy Altar. Each time before entering, in addition to the prayers prescribed in the ritual of Holy Mass, His Eminence would say:

– Forgive me, Lord, for daring once again to enter the Holy Altar and serve You unworthily!

Metropolitan Bartholomew’s prayer was always the same. He said it with sincerity, fear and trembling. While some, perhaps many, who said he was an atypical monk, entered the Holy Altar as if God could do nothing without them, Metropolitan Bartholomew’s heart tightened as he approached the Holy Mass. He did not think of himself as a saint; on the contrary, he recognised his weaknesses and limitations and prayed in silence, for himself and for others, like a true monk. Metropolitan Bartholomew was not an atypical monk, he was a true MONK.

(Mihaela Ion, Memories of Metropolitan Bartholomew Ananias, Andreas Publishing House, Bucharest, 2010, pp. 6-11, 20-39, 54-60, 68-80, 88-95)