Documenting the ‘silent witnesses’ of faith

By Patty Gayes
Contributor

For many years, Catholic schoolchildren learned to “offer up” their daily sacrifices to God. For many girls in 20th century Eastern Europe, this became an especially important lesson: the small sacrifices gave them the fortitude to withstand years of demeaning and sometimes tortuous treatment.

Many grew up to be religious sisters living in convents and working primarily as schoolteachers before World War II and the Soviet occupation. After the war, Soviets saw these religious communities as threats and began to make life living hell for the sisters.
“I worry about children today, because it doesn’t seem they learn about sacrifice anymore,” said Ss. Cyril and Methodius Sister John Vianney Vranak who has made it her mission to document the experiences of her fellow sisters in Slovakia.

“These sisters were truly grateful they were allowed to be united with the sufferings of Christ, for the redemption of the world,” Vranak said. Listening to their stories, she said, may make the difference in today’s young generation having such strength when faced with difficult times.

In late 2003, two Sisters of St. Joseph from Kansas visited the Chicago convent of the Sisters of St. Casimir where Vranak lives. Sisters Margaret Nacke and Mary Savoie were already documenting the stories of sisters in other countries formerly in the Soviet bloc, including Lithuania, Romania, Hungary, Ukraine and the Czech Republic. Since Vranak’s heritage is Slovakian and she had visited the Slovak Republic several times, they sought her help.

Since then, Vranak has interviewed about 100 sisters in Slovakia, and has heard many stories of faith and courage.

“On Aug. 29, 1950, all of the major superiors of religious communities in Slovakia were summoned to Bratislava,” she said. “They were told the convents would be liquidated the next day. The superiors didn’t even have time to contact all the sisters, so those in convents in the outlying areas were surprised the next morning. A bus and a truck pulled up in front, and a decree was read that by order of the government and permission of the superiors—a lie—the sisters were to leave that day.”

Each sister could take one suitcase, a mattress and a feather quilt,” said Vranak. “Their belongings went into the truck, and the sisters went into the bus, which had curtains over the windows, so the villagers wouldn’t know what was happening and so the sisters would not know where they were going.”

They had no idea where they were headed or when—or even if—they would return, she said, emotion filling her eyes. “Some thought they were going to Siberia to be martyred. As they loaded into that bus, do you know what they did? They sang!”

Sisters who had been schoolteachers had their licenses revoked because they refused to teach atheistic socialism. The Soviets put them to work, some in nursing, most, Vranak said, in flax factories. “This was work that no one else wanted,” she said, working in steamy, 90-degree heat, usually standing in water.

“They were deprived of doing the work they were trained to do. They lived in crowded, deplorable conditions. In Slovakia, the sisters could only wear their habits inside, not in public. At all times, they were demeaned, in the hope that the orders would fall apart,” Vranak said.

Sometimes, the treatment went beyond difficult to deadly. Sister Zdenka, a sister of Mercy of the Holy Cross, was sentenced to 10 years in prison for allowing a priest to escape while caring for him in the hospital. She was tortured for three years, becoming ill and dying July 31, 1955. She was beatified Sept. 14, 2003.
The sisters who survived reported that they attributed their strength to the fact that most were able to continue to receive Eucharist, walking miles to small towns where Communists allowed Mass, Vranak said, “because they thought their interest would die out after a generation.”

But their plans were thwarted. Novices who had been in formation were forced to return home when the religious communities were closed, Vranak said. “Secretly, though, these women kept the spirit of their congregations alive, and invited others to join them. Even some of their parents were not aware their daughters had committed to the religious life. They were the silent witnesses in the world.”

Sisters in Slovakia today are working in the flourishing Catholic schools, and vocations are on the increase. Most of the sisters who were involved in the Communist occupation of their country are now retired.

Their stories, and those of the religious in other Eastern European countries, will live on—thanks to the mission of the documentarians. Catholic Theological Union in Chicago has agreed to eventually house the documents, including interviews, photographs, and other evidence of the sisters’ ordeal of faith.