Stanislav Pavlík

“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.”

“Since I was a priest, they made me a commander of the room, and we were thus left there without any other guard. There was one Dominican priest in our room. We would get up one hour before the wake-up time, at about 5 in the morning, and put our clothes on. The priest was then able to celebrate the mass, because he had a copy of prayers to Virgin Mary called Salve. It was still dark, and I used a torch to shine into Marek’s missal book and we held the liturgy. This way we could thus stay connected to what kept us going.”

“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.”