Română
In this emotional video recording, Fr. Elefterie (Paduraru) of Carbuna Monastery, Romania, talks about a series of miracles he witnessed during the construction of the monastery.
#orthodox #church #miracle
© TRINITAS TV, Romanian Orthodox Church, September 2021
Watch the full interview on TRINITAS TV channel
Fr. Elefterie:
Once I finished the Akathist service, a thought came to my mind: I should go to the main market…
I was a new in this monastery, for only a year. I didn’t really have relationships, acquaintances.
I was thinking: I should go and maybe I meet someone I know and ask him to lend me some money to pay the workers and postpone the deadline a little bit.
[I left and] When I got here where the bell tower is, I looked down on the way. An old man was coming up the hill. Forgive me. I’m emotional right now…
I waited for the old man to arrive, and when he got here… The man said: “I want to talk to Fr. Elefterie!” And I said to him: “It’s me!” And… He said: let’s go to church for a while. And we entered the church… He venerated the icon of the Mother of God because we had no other [big] icon. Then he turned to me. And he said: “I know you really need 15 million lei [around 500 USD at that time, 2002]” He put his hand in his pocket, took out and gave me the money…
This man’s name was Ioan and his wife Alexandra. He also left me a commemoration list, he said they were from Targu Neamt [Romania]. I knew the priests from Targu Neamt. And I asked them because I wanted to meet those people after that. I didn’t find them anymore. He was about 80 years old, he walked with a stick in his hand. I said that he was rather a messenger of the Mother of God.
I can’t say this too much because no one believes me.
The miracles continued at the Carbuna Skete, when the painting of the church began, again, the father ran out of money. We had no money at all. We painted the holy altar, but we only had a verbal agreement that we will pay… And after we finished painting the holy altar the painter went to the other side of the church and after a while he said to me:
“Father, I would like to go home [he was from Movilita near Buzau]”. It was about 2 weeks since he stayed here. “Give me some bucks, please, so I can go home…”
I asked him: “How much should I pay you?” This happened on Friday. On Friday evening, Justinian, who was one of the first monks here, had come to me. Justinian is a father who is not at home right now, but he will be back. He came to my cell and we were discussing what to say to the painter the next morning… Sure, we had no money… How can we give him 40 million lei… we barely had 27 million.
When we were talking, it was 10 o’clock in the evening, someone knocked on the door. I got up from the chair and opened the door. When I opened, there was a man who is an actor in Bucharest, I won’t tell you the name because it’s our secret. He was tall, he filled the door frame when he entered. After him was his wife and a sister.
They came in, we greeted each other. His wife asks me, “Do you know why we came at this hour?” I said: “No”. “To see you rejoicing.” It was an enigma, I didn’t know why she said that.
We talked a little longer and she opened her bag… and took out… 40 million lei…
