Alexandru Todea, 89; Eastern Rite Cardinal Resisted Communism

Cardinal Alexandru Todea, who became a symbol of Catholic resistance for spending more than 14 years in communist prisons after refusing to give up his religion, has died. He was 89.

Todea died Tuesday in a hospital in the Transylvanian city of Targu Mures, the Eastern Rite Catholic Church said Wednesday.

Pope John Paul II sent a telegram of sympathy, recalling Todea’s faith under the former “tyrannical regime.”

In 1948, the communist state banned the Eastern Rite Catholic Church and declared all priests who refused to give up their religion enemies of the state. Eastern Rite Catholics follow the Eastern Orthodox ritual, but the church’s authority is in Rome. Almost 90% of Romania’s 23 million people are Eastern Orthodox and about 1% are Eastern Rite Catholics.

Todea’s ordeal began in 1946 when the communist regime, which came to power after World War II, imprisoned hundreds of thousands of priests, intellectuals and politicians deemed to be “dangerous and impossible to convert to communist ideals.”

Between 1946 and 1948, Todea was imprisoned and released five times by the Securitate, the communist secret police.

After his arrest in 1948, Todea escaped from prison and remained in hiding for three years. During those years he was secretly made a bishop.

Todea was caught in 1951 and sentenced to life in prison. He was released 12 years later, when communist leader Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej granted amnesty to political prisoners.

After his release, Todea continued to fight for religious freedom, writing more than 30 petitions to communist authorities.

At a secret meeting in 1986, the church’s bishops elected Todea leader of the church, giving him the rank of Metropolitan.

After the collapse of communism in Romania in 1989, the church was recognized by the state. In 1990, the pope recognized Todea as the leader of the Romanian Eastern Rite Church. A year later, the Vatican gave Todea the rank of cardinal.

Todea retired from the executive leadership of the church in 1992 after suffering a stroke.

Born in the Transylvanian village of Teleac, Todea studied theology in Rome and was ordained as a priest in 1939. A year later, he received a doctorate in theology at a Catholic university, also in Rome. He returned to Romania in 1940 as a priest and a teacher of Latin and Italian.

A funeral service was scheduled for Tuesday at the Metropolitan Cathedral in Blaj, 185 miles northwest of Bucharest.