Experiences of Divine Light.Father George Calciu.

Father George Calciu.

Gheorghe Calciu-Dumitreasa (1925-2006) was a Romanian priest and dissident. He served 21 years in prison during the Communist regime. He was first imprisoned in 1948, but claimed his 1978 imprisonment was harsher. He had criticized Nicolae Ceausescu’s repressions and became seen as an "enemy of the state". Reportedly he suffered beatings and harassment in prison. He was released from prison due in part to pressure from supporters such as U.S. president Ronald Reagan. He spent years in exile in Virginia and ultimately settled there permanently. In the mid-1980s he preached on the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe.

After being defrocked by the Romanian Orthodox Church, Calciu-Dumitreasa became a priest of the Orthodox Church in America, which never recognised his defrocking. In 1989 he took charge of the Holy Cross Romanian Orthodox Church at Alexandria, Virginia. In his last years he revisited his native land several times and met some of those whom he had influenced. He remained critical of certain Romanian Orthodox bishops to his last day, claiming they were former Securitate secret police infiltrators.

Calciu-Dumitreasa died of pancreatic cancer on November 21, 2006 at Inova Fairfax Hospital in Woodburn, Fairfax County. He was survived by his wife of over 40 years, Adriana, and their son, Andrei. He was interred at the Petru Vodă Monastery in Poiana Teiului Commune, Neamţ County, Romania.

 

 

 I will tell you of my experience. Before I was arrested, I always liked the monasteries. So every time I had the possibility to go to a monastery, I was there. Very near to Bucharest is a very important monastery called Cernica. The prayer of the heart to Jesus Christ was taken by George, a disciple of Paisius Velichkovsky, and brought to Cernica. From then until now-nearly two centuries-in Cernica every monk performs this prayer. Even during the persecution by Ceausescu, nothing could stop them from praying, nothing could make them unworthy to see the true Light, the Uncreated Light.

One Sunday I was there in the church of Cernica, officiating at the Holy Liturgy with some monks. At the beginning of the Liturgy Fr. Benedict Ghius (1904- 1990) was there, a very spiritual monk. He had been the spiritual leader (not the organizer) in the Antim Monastery of the Burning Bush, which was a group dedicated to prayer, formed by monks for the sake of the most important intellectuals in Bucharest during the Communist regime. People from the Burning Bush were arrested until the group was exterminated, and many of them died in prison. Fr. Ghius was arrested, too, but he was set free at the same time I was1965. And he gave up everything and entered the Cernica Monastery, where he practiced the Prayer of Jesus. He was perhaps the most loved by God. I never saw him sad or angry.

Father Benedict Gius.

Because he was very old, he didn't serve. As we started our Liturgy, he was sitting in a chair in the altar, without moving. At a certain moment I felt something strange in the altar. I looked at my left and saw that in the corner where Fr. Ghius was -a Light started to shine. The Light covered Fr. Ghius completely but it did not spread through the altar. It was just around his body. I am sure Fr. Ghius was not aware what happened to him. The other monks saw what I was seeing, but they paid no attention because they were accustomed to this. They had seen it many times; it was something very normal to them. I was very shocked. And this Light persisted until the Liturgy was finished. When Fr. Ghius came to take Communion, his hands were hands of Light. I bowed in front of him, and he felt very, very ashamed- I think because he felt he was unworthy such respect. He left the altar without looking at anybody. A he went out, I saw how the Light disappeared and he became normal person, a normal man.

He was sitting on a chair in the altar, without moving. But if you looked at him, knowing nothing about the Light of Jesus Christ, about Uncreated Light, you could see his face full Light.

I kept in my mind what I had seen; and passing through different events from my life, I remembered another situation like this. I myself have had this experience with the Light of God. I told you that I was the son of a peasant family, a very simple family, and that I was guided in my spiritual life by my mom, who was a true lay ascetic herself. She taught me how to listen to the Liturgy and the prayers; she taught me how to pray. She had no words to explain this. She only told me, "To direct your heart to God, you have to stay in the church without making noise or moving or anything like that, and listen to the priest, He is the servant of God; he is the visible image of Jesus Christ." She also told me about Communion. It was difficult for me to understand how the bread and the wine I was taking was really the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, but I believed because my mom had great authority in my eyes. Because my mom said,

“It IS the Blood and the Body of Christ;” I was convinced without any explanations. No theology can understand it, nobody knows how it is, but we believe it and it is true.

When I was eight years old, I was standing in front of my parents' land. I remember this exactly- I have been followed by this image all the time; it was especially strong during my imprisonment. I was looking over the fence; the field of wheat was very great, and I was really moved in my soul thinking about God Who created the world. I was remembering what the priest had said the previous Sunday, I was remembering what my mom had said to me-and then in a moment, I realized that the field was full of Light. I could not understand what it was: this Light had no shadow and no perspective. Perhaps because I was accustomed to the image of natural light on the land, I could see all the details, but only in light, not in shadow. I was as if petrified. I don't know how long I was like that; and when I recovered, the field was normal. I said nothing about it to my sister or my brother. But, later, when I was a student in high school, I told my mother about it. She was not astonished. I suppose she knew something about it, but she only made the sign of the Cross on me. Then to my surprise she kissed my hand. I did not understand this at that time; later I understood that she was kissing not my hand but the body of this child who had seen the Light of God.

  

"And in your Light we see Light".

When I was in prison I had two other experiences of this­ Light. Yesterday I told you of some events and I said that there were other aspects of chose events that I could not say to you yesterday. But I will tell you of them today.

I'll repeat what happened on Pascha in 1980 (I was arrested in 1978). In 1980 I was in Aiud Prison. That night I heard, me bells I remembered Paschas in the past. They were very strong in my imagination: a Pascha when I was a child, a Pascha when I was a student, a previous Pascha in prison.

In the morning the new shift: of the guards came. When the guard came into my cell I didn't turn my face to the wall as I was supposed to, but said to him, "Christ is Risen!" He looked at me and at me other guards. As you will recall, that guard was the most sadistic man I had ever met in my life. He could not accomplish his eight-hour shift without beating and torturing the inmates. His face was like that of an angel, very beautiful, very elegant, but I never saw such cruelty in a man. Nevertheless he answered me, "In Truth He is Risen!" This shocked me very much. He shut the door and I was petrified because of what he had said. And little by little, I saw myself full of Light. The board against the wall was shining like the sun; everything in my cell was full of light. I cannot explain in words the happiness that invaded me then. I can explain nothing. It simply happened. I have no merit. I was perhaps the biggest sinner in that section, bur nevertheless God gave me this Light. Perhaps when I was a child He gave it to me because I was innocent then, bur why did God choose me for this and not another one? In my village there were perhaps a hundred children more innocent than I was. So don't ask me why God chose me and nor another one.

In a short rime this Light disappeared, but the happiness lasted many hours. Later I had that incident with the colonel when I stared to give arguments to him, to explain to him why I believed in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. But can you imagine?-I felt then that I was like a fallen angel. I tried to explain to someone what the Resurrection of Jesus Christ meant and why I believed in it; but as I told you yesterday, there is no explanation, there is no justification in human words. I think God gave me a lesson when I said to the guard, "Christ is Risen!" My affirmation was so strong, my faith in it was so overwhelming, that he answered me, "In Truth He is Risen!" And now I was trying by syllogisms to explain to the colonel, a grown man, an atheist, why I believed in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. And really, I did feel like a fallen angel. I had fallen from that vision of the Uncreated Light of God entering human life.

The next experience I had with Uncreated Light was a year and a half later, when I was in prison in the same cell with those two criminals. I told you that something else happened when I was celebrating the Liturgy with them.

This is what happened: When I turned to them after receiving Communion, I saw them on their knees and surrounded by the Light. They were in this Light, visible Light, Uncreated Light but visible.... God just opened my eyes to see this Light, and they were surrounded by it. I noticed that the whole cell was full of Light. I didn't know then and I don't know now when this Light appeared. Perhaps when I started the Liturgy the Light was around us, but l was concentrating only on the holy service. Perhaps the Light appeared at the moment when I uttered the epiklesis-and from the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ the Light spread into the cell. Or perhaps the Light appeared just at the moment when I turned to them, or perhaps they had been surrounded by this Light all the time.

This Light transformed their souls! Not my prayers or my serving at the Holy Liturgy. God transformed their souls by pouring this Uncreated Light upon them. By this Light we were able to love one another, to pray and to feel that we had something in common. It was the presence of God, of Jesus Christ.

I do not know if they realized the presence of the Light that I saw in the cell, but this Light operated in their souls and transformed them into my brothers. The Energy of Jesus Christ changed them from criminals into, perhaps, saints, I cannot believe that after that they became criminals again. I am convinced that­ they were saved, and I pray for them all the time; even today I am praying for them. Never in my prayers do I see them as criminals. I am sure they were saved.

The Light brought about a very sweet consequence in my soul. I didn’t fall on the earth. I don’t know why I didn’t, for I was not prepared for it.

 

 

Reference:

Father George Calciu. Interviews, homilies and talks. Saint Herman of Alaska brotherhood. 2010.