The prayer that “messes with your mind”

We were four prisoners in a cell on the ground floor of Aiud prison: Iustin Pârvu, Father Cocâlnău, Father Mihai Lungeanu, and myself, Pătrașcu Vasile. I had just returned to the cell after three days of isolation—a strict regime in which for two days we received no food and on the third day only a small portion, spending nights on the cold floor even in December.

Back in the cell, we rose and Father Iustin Pârvu blessed two chalices: one representing our Lord Jesus Christ, and the other the Annunciation, which we all knew by heart.

It was Christmas Eve. During the holidays, security around the prison intensified. Next to our cell, also on the ground floor, were Fr. Adrian Cărăușu and Eugen Măgirescu, a fourth-year theology student from Iași who was also studying law. While we recited the akathist in prayer, Radu Gyr’s “Christmas Carols” were being sung nearby.

Barabas, one of the guards patrolling, heard the singing, miscounted the cells from his corner, and mockingly asked why we were singing. Standing at the door, I told him we were not singing, advising him to check carefully. After three inquiries, he closed the window and left, only to return moments later with the ward boss—one of the notorious Biro brothers, who had killed many prisoners by trampling them.

Biro, like Barabas, came from the same region—the Altai Urals and the Pannonian Plain. Without a word, he waved us off to the “black cell,” where we were kept until lunchtime. When his assistant arrived, we were sent back to our cell. But this was not the end: two days later, all four of us were isolated in separate cells under strict confinement, and Barabas reported that we had been singing—though we had not.

Father Iustin and the elderly Father Cocâlnău were placed together in one cell; Mihai Lungeanu and I were placed in another. Father Cocâlnău was old and sick. Once the head of the tram controllers in Iași, he had lost his entire family to imprisonment—his wife, daughter, and son. He remained in bed, weak, passing a few pills from hand to hand in silence.

After three weeks of learning the “prayer of the heart” from Father Iustin Pârvu, he called me to his bedside and whispered that his head ached from praying even in his sleep. I smiled and replied:

It would be good, old man, if I, too, could mess my head up in prayer and recite the prayer of the heart day and night: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, the sinner.”

Initially, we feared that Father Cocâlnău might die in isolation. Yet it became clear that God had intended for him to remain with Father Iustin Pârvu, whose prayers and encouragement strengthened him. After two weeks, Father Cocâlnău returned to the cell from which he had been taken.

(Fr. Vasile Pușcașu – With Fr. Iustin Pârvu on death, sacrifice and love; pp. 27–29)