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Cardinal Alexandru Todea

Romanian priest imprisoned under the Communist regime

Friday 24 May 2002 00:00 BST
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Alexandru Todea, priest: born Teleac, Romania 5 June 1912; ordained priest 1939; Archbishop of Blaj 1950-90; Metropolitan of Fagaras and Alba Iulia 1990-94; named a Cardinal 1991; died Targu Mures, Romania 21 May 2002.

Alexandru Todea – only the second ever Romanian cardinal – headed Romania's Eastern rite Catholic Church in the difficult transition period from an underground to a legal Church. Sentenced by Romania's Communist rulers to life imprisonment for "high treason", he once shared a cell with five other bishops and eight priests. As he later recounted with some humour, Todea was made head of the lavatory cleaning brigade.

Alexandru Todea was born into a peasant family in 1912 in the village of Teleac in Mures county. He was the 13th of 16 children. He studied with the French Assumptionist fathers in Blaj and in 1933 went on to do further studies in Rome at the Propaganda Fide College. After graduating in theology and ordination in 1939 he returned to Romania in 1940 and became secretary to the Eastern rite Metropolitan. After the Second World War and the Communist takeover of Romania, the days of the Eastern rite Catholic Church were numbered. Suspicion of the Catholic Church abounded, and it was in March 1945, after a sermon on the anniversary of the election of Pope Pius XII, that Fr Todea was first arrested. But he escaped from prison.

Stalin banned the Ukrainian Catholic Church in newly conquered western Ukraine in 1946, and at his instigation, other countries followed suit, Romania in 1948, Czechoslovakia in 1950. With the collaboration of Orthodox hierarchs, notably Metropolitan Nicolae Balan of Sibiu, the Romanian government began its attacks on the Papacy and the Catholic Church.

The Orthodox Church "invited" the Eastern rite Catholics to rejoin and the government enforced a reign of terror, with threats of deportation to Siberia for those who refused. After a "reunion" meeting in Cluj, attended by only a minority of Eastern rite priests, the Romanian authorities arrested all the bishops on 28 October 1948, together with leading theologians, priests, nuns and laypeople. The Church officially ceased to exist.

Of the 651 priests in Todea's diocese, 250 became Orthodox, while 401 refused. Of these, 300 were arrested and 101 went underground. A week before the Cluj meeting took place and two weeks before the arrest of the bishops, Todea was arrested. He was taken to the police station, but the two guards foolishly left him in a room with the door open. Todea promptly fled. He immediately went underground, living with a family in Reghin for more than two years. The family slept in one room, Todea in the kitchen. He rarely went out.

One exception was in November 1950, when he went to Bucharest where, in the sanctuary of the Latin rite cathedral, he was consecrated Archbishop of Blaj by Bishop Iosef Schubert, who was himself arrested in 1951. Todea was to have been consecrated earlier by the Papal Nuncio in Bucharest, Archbishop Gerald O'Hara, but he had been expelled from the country in July 1950.

Todea immediately set about organising his Archdiocese from his hideaway. But the secret police were to catch up with him eventually. On 31 January 1951 they discovered his cubbyhole – after more than 12 hours waiting in the kitchen for him to return home while Todea crouched in the darkness. He was immediately taken to Bucharest, where a 13-month investigation began.

Once during the investigation he was told to stand on one foot with his hands above his head until he would sign a statement renouncing his Catholicism. A kindly guard allowed him to stand on both feet, alerting him with a cough when another guard approached.

Todea's trial finally began in 1952 on charges of high treason. The prosecutor demanded the death penalty, but instead Todea was sentenced to life imprisonment "as a servant of the Vatican, the greatest enemy of Communism" and for "constituting a threat to the new style of life which brings happiness to the people". He became prisoner No 51 in Sighet prison.

Todea shared a cell with eight priests and four Latin rite Catholic bishops, including Bishop Schubert who had consecrated him, and Aron Marton of Alba Iulia. "There, united in suffering, we worked together, hungry, mocked and mistreated," he said later. Among those Todea gave the last rites to in prison were Iuliu Maniu, leader of the Romanian Peasant Party, and the historian Gheorghe Bratianu.

By the time of the 1956 Hungarian uprising, Todea was in solitary confinement in Rumnicu Sarat prison. "I was hosed in our cell as were other priests, as if we were responsible for the Hungarian uprising," he recalled later. Pressure continued throughout his imprisonment for him to go over to the Orthodox Church. He was even offered the post of Metropolitan. But he steadfastly refused.

In 1964 Romania was seeking help from the outside world, and the numbers of political prisoners were becoming an embarrassment. About 10,000 were freed, Todea reportedly being one of the last 25. On his release, though, he was told not to work as a priest. But he returned to Reghin and ignored the ban. He was refused permission to teach Latin, so he applied for a job as a road sweeper, mentioning his prison experience. But he was told he was not the type for such work. He protested – to no avail – that in a Communist society anyone should be prepared to do any work.

So he was left to continue his priestly work, saying Mass in private homes, conducting funerals and campaigning for the Church's relegalisation. Todea later reported that during the years of illegality there were some 35 petitions to the government, running to more than 300 pages. Todea was able to keep in touch with the Vatican: the then special envoy for Eastern Europe Archbishop Luigi Poggi was able to meet him secretly several times. In 1986 Todea was elected Metropolitan of the Church at a secret gathering of the bishops.

Todea's eighth and last arrest was in 1989 after he had conducted the funeral of the philosopher Ioan Miclea. He was held for only six hours, and was told in confidence that the authorities were afraid to imprison him for fear of adverse Western reaction. The end of the long Ceausescu years was in sight, with Communist regimes falling across Eastern Europe. In December that year Nicolae Ceausescu was at last overthrown and the National Salvation Front seized power. One of its first moves, on the last day of 1989, was to lift the 1948 ban on the Romanian Eastern rite Church. Todea – by then 77 – was left to sort out the problems of legalisation: the lack of priests and churches, bitter conflicts with the Orthodox over property, an unauthorised bishop who came forward.

In March 1990 the Vatican appointed Todea Metropolitan of Fagaras and Alba Iulia, thus officially making him head of the Eastern rite Church. His installation had to take place in the open air, as the Orthodox had not handed back his cathedral. In October he made his first visit to Rome for 50 years to attend the Synod of Bishops. In 1991 he was made a cardinal, only the second Romanian (after his late colleague Iuliu Hossu) to be appointed to the Sacred College. However, failing health meant that Todea had to leave the day-to-day leadership of the Church in other hands.

When Pope John Paul II made his historic visit to Romania in May 1999, the ailing Todea had to be carried into St Joseph's cathedral in Bucharest for the papal Mass. Applause was long and emotional when John Paul embraced Todea. Two weeks after the visit, President Emil Constantinescu awarded Todea the country's highest honour, the Star of Romania, though he was too ill to travel to Bucharest to receive the award in the same ceremony as Patriarch Teoctist of the Orthodox Church.

Cardinal Todea always spoke deprecatingly of his many years of suffering, recalling threatening situations with humour. But his tenacity, loyalty and fearlessness made him a worthy successor to Hossu as leader of his Church.

Felix Corley

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