Jiří Beran

“You were always afraid of something. For instance, I know I could never make it through torture. I know I couldn't stand it, I know I would have a hard time being in prison with my family left to fend for themselves. I did certain things like making copies of literature, printing banned literature. Here, in my basement under the coal, I had a plastic bag with certain publications that I regularly gave to certain people, distributed to people. Someone came to get five copies of Lidové noviny, someone came for Informace o církvi. They were unpublished materials. Which I had hidden in my basement under coal for no reason. Someone had those at home and could be afraid of a house search. I wasn't afraid of having my house searched because I had it stored in the basement but still, sometimes you were perhaps more afraid than necessary.”

“We had our wedding in 1975, and as religious people, it was important for us to have the wedding in a church. We were looking forward to it and spent half a year preparing. Obviously one could not have a wedding ceremony in a church only, you had to go to the municipal office for the main wedding, so to speak. And what was going on in the church, that was considered private business. But I don't consider religion to be a private thing, I think it should overlap with the other area too. And so we wanted to somehow express that we were going to get married in a church and that we didn't take the municipal office wedding too seriously. So it was just us and the witnesses at that wedding, that's four people. And the office worker, when she saw me, in some polyester trousers and a striped pullover, she said: “This is how you want to present yourself before a state authority?” I said: “Yes.” My wife was in a pretty skirt, with a pretty blouse. “Alright. Do you have your rings?” “Nah, we won't have those until tomorrow's church wedding.” “And does the bride have her bouquet?” “Nah, the bouquet is being made right now, it'll also be ready tomorrow for the church.” And so the wedding went on silently, the office workers were shaking their heads a little, we were nevertheless married and could have a normal wedding in the church.”