Stanislav Pavlík

“Gabriel had a label, taken probably from some clothes, and he took it and he tore it in half. He said: ‘This part is yours, and somebody who has the other half will come to you. If you are able to put the two parts together, you can trust him.’ This way I was connected to East Bohemia, to a community which was gathering in Eagle Mountains. People from Brno were coming there. We had our formation there. At the end of 1970 we had spiritual exercises and preparation for ordination; there were about four of us. I got some assignment and I had to study something. They ordained me a deacon and my ordination as a priest was scheduled for January 2, 1971 in Brno. On the New Year’s Day I was leaving for Rychnov nad Kněžnou at 5 o’clock in the morning. There was a bishop there, but I didn’t know about him that he had been an ordained bishop. The person who led all this and who was known to some people was Felix Davídek. He lived in Brno, and he had spent 11 years in prison. He was a diocese priest and he had a low threshold for risk. However, he warned us that we could not take any risks because we would then immediately put other people in danger. He was born in 1924 and he died in 1988. Felix tried to find those who studied theology even though they were married. He arrived to Eagle Mountains about two times, otherwise there was another bishop – also from Brno – who was coming there. I spent the night in Rychnov and from there we went to Hradec Králové, where we picked up Josef Novák. We went to Brno together, and there we were ordained by Felix Davídek. He would always take two persons at a time, so that each of them would have a witness. There was no other way, so this was done so that everyone would at least have a personal witness.”

“Then came the night: Action K. StB policemen stormed into the monastery and they ordered us to pack only the most important things. They told us that they would transport us to another place where we would be able to carry on in our monastic life. We didn’t know where they were taking us. We were guarded by the police. I was an uneducated man, all in all, I have not done any study yet, but while I was there, I received the New Testament, which was translated by Dominican Father Škrabal. By chance I opened it on the Gospel of Luke 12:11: ‘When you are brought before synagogues, rulers and authorities, do not worry about how you will defend yourselves or what you will say,‘ Luke 12:12: ‘for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that time what you should say.‘ This verse has actually been guiding me throughout my entire life, and that’s why I’m talking about it. Then they transported us to Broumov. The Dominicans from Prague, who had been taken there a week earlier, were already there, and they gave us a welcome.”

“An electricity distribution station was being built there. It was a considerable distance to transport material there. I got two bricklayers and I myself was bringing bricks to them. They were building the upper floor and I was standing at the bottom and passing them the bricks. The wheelbarrow was quite sturdy and I could carry up to seventy bricks in it. I balanced the load so that I would be able to push the wheelbarrow up there. They needed the workers to compete with one another, and there was I with such an outstanding work performance. They thus suggested that they would promote me to a lance-corporal’s rank. This has not happened to any other person in the priests’ column and in the entire Auxiliary Technical Battalions. There was certain danger, too, because the others might suspect that I was collaborating with them. But I was probably a person so simple that it has not occurred to anyone. For me, this promotion was ridiculous. There were several battalions in Komárno. There were two columns made of priests: one of them was transferred to Podbořany, and one of them was left in Slovakia. I stayed in Slovakia the whole time. Then they transported us to Komárno. There set up a platform there and we were to march there to receive our rewards. I didn’t even know how to march properly. I survived it. The rewards included an alarm clock, for instance, which I would have liked, but I didn’t get it. I got a game of chess, but I wasn’t a chess player, and I still have it even now.”