Professor PhDr. Tomáš Petráček , Th.D.
* 1972
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“When I finished these studies in 1999, I wanted to enter the seminar, which I already wanted to enter in the early 1990s. Already in 1992, I applied to the Jesuit order, but since I was very ill, ill for four years, and I didn't know how it would go in terms of my health, I first graduated from the Philosophical Faculty and then to verify that my health was adequate stable ... then I decided to go to the priesthood seminary, but my diploma thesis was so interesting that I was asked by the Institute management if I wanted to do it as a postgraduate. So, for a year I went to the postgraduate studies and then in 2000 I started a priestly seminary.”
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“Well, I did not experience childhood and youth somehow ... I do not know what it was, if by some sensitivity, for example the Communist elementary school was hell, to a certain extent. I hated it there, the drill, such spiritlessness. And we had good teachers, it wasn't bad. Still, I was physically sick of the regime. Or the atmosphere in the society. Such general hypocrisy, now the militiamen, the rituals to commemorate the October Revolution, when we had to go to the Red-Army men graves, and all these things... when one knew it was some kind of a system, a system of lies. ”
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“The contradiction between the official interpretation of history and the official ideology they taught us in school, and which we constantly perceived from normalization television, where there were at least a few war films every week to remind us of what we owe the Soviet Union. I remember it quite traumatically, because as there were constantly the resistance movements and resistance films, one of my traumas of my whole childhood was that I was getting ready for the situation when some Gestapo come to arrest me and begin to torture me. They would start pushing pins under my nails and pulling my nails, so I must not reveal my friends from the resistance movement at any cost. I was actually preparing for it all the time. I was still not sure if I would fail at this crucial moment or not. It's going to look bizarre to people today, but this was the way how at least I experienced it.”
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Full recordings
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Hradec Králové, 18.10.2019
(audio)
duration: 01:00:22
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Hradec Králové, 13.12.2019
(audio)
duration: 01:47:47
Full recordings are available only for logged users.
Let us strive to live like we should die tomorrow
Tomáš Petráček was born on May 18, 1972 in Hořice. He has been interested in history since his childhood. He attended a local history club. During his studies at the grammar school in Hořice in 1986-1990 he did a professional student work in the field of history and archeology. As a graduation student he experienced the Velvet Revolution and became a member of the strike committee. He studied history and anthropology at the Charles University. In 2000 he joined a seminary and in 2005 he was ordained a priest. He works as a university chaplain in Hradec Králové, as a teacher at the Charles University and the University of Hradec Králové. He is the postulator of Father Josef Toufar. He was appointed a professor of Charles University In December 2019.
