The sufferings of confessor Marin Naidim
In any totalitarian regime, opinions, especially political ones, are forbidden and punished by decrees that ignore the most basic rules of law. Ion Antonescu called himself the ruler of a totalitarian regime and, because it was wartime, he thought he was justified in ordering the suppression of all attitudes contrary to the interests of the state. This was the case with the young former members of the Buzău Brotherhood of the Cross, who had been active during the period of the National Legion government. One of these members, Virgil Maxim, was recently featured in our “Remembering the Church” column.
Today we try to give a short biography of another member, a former colleague of Virgil Maxim. This is Marin Naidim, who is often mentioned by memoirists, survivors of communist prisons, as an example of Christian life.
Marin Naidim was born on 6 March 1922 in Râmniceni, Râmnicu Sărat county, in the family of a tax agent. In June 1942, he graduated from the Normal School of Buzău and, according to Securitate investigation documents, he handed over the leadership of the Brotherhood of the Cross in the same town to Virgil Maxim. In the autumn of 1942, as the series of arrests of young people still considered active in the Brotherhoods of the Cross had begun, Marin Naidim was arrested on 10 November, while he was in the Râmnicu Sărat recruitment centre, and sent to the Buzău Securitate investigation. After the tortures of the investigation, on 1 December 1942 he was transferred to Ploiești Prison with his other former colleagues. He was tried in the FDC lot, group no. 14, and sentenced by order no. 14.409 of 3 December 1942 by the Court Martial of the 5th Territorial Corps of Ploiești to 25 years’ hard labour and the revocation of his diplomas for “collecting fees and contributions for the purposes of forbidden associations” and “setting up clandestine associations contrary to state order”.
Within a few days he was sent to Aiud prison, where he experienced a harsh regime of imprisonment, consisting of poor food and repeated corporal punishment, some of it on religious holidays. Despite this, Naidim was distinguished by his chosen Christian life and was part of the group of mystics alongside Valeriu Gafencu, Anghel Papacioc and the priest Vasile Serghie. In September 1944, he was transferred to the Alba Iulia penitentiary for a month, and later worked on the farms of Galda and Unirea.
In April 1948, he returned to Aiud to find the prison chapel destroyed by the authorities, a sign that the prison regime had changed. His salvation, like that of many other prisoners, was the genuinely Christian way of life noted by many historians of the communist period. In this regard, Gabriel Bălănescu says: “Marin Naidim dominated by his behaviour, his culture – made in prison – and a great capacity of love for everyone around him. In the dormitory where Naidim lived, there was an atmosphere unlike any other. It was the same in the teams where he worked. A conflict, which is common in prison, was impossible with Marin Naidim! He overcame it with a skill worthy of a professional diplomat… Naidim was also well-balanced in that he was modest about his religious life. Only a keen observer could notice Naidim’s moments of absence, when he prayed or fasted. In all his actions he was extraordinarily discreet, and in religious discussions he did not try to impose his point of view. But he imposed it by his unobtrusive actions”.
Between January 1951 and September 1953, Naidim was sent to do hard labour in the Baia Sprie mine, then returned to Aiud. He refused re-education and was punished several times by the guards. On 10 December 1958, a search of his cell revealed “two notebooks written in ink and a cross made of bone”. An investigation was ordered and Marin Naidim was placed in solitary confinement for 10 days. He was one of the last prisoners to be released from Aiud on 28 July 1964. But his freedom was like a second prison, as the Securitate followed him every step of the way.
(Adrian Nicolae Petcu – Lumina Newspaper)