{Fr. Roman Braga} ~no one can take the image of God from within us

"Fr. Roman did not want any eulogies. He did not want people’s tears. As he said, the
soul needs not tears but prayers. And he referred to himself as a great sinner. Such was his humility. It is this holy humility coupled with love that I am sure have vouchsafed him rest among the saints, taking his place as one of them.

Fr. Roman lived for 93 years and did not have an easy life. When the communists took
over Romania he was imprisoned not once but twice. And as a priest, the communists took special care to be cruel through physical and psychological torture, through isolation and solitary confinement. Who would give thanks for that? Yet Fr. Roman said he was grateful for what the communists did to him because by stripping away all his possessions, even his liberty and the community of others, as they tried to turn him into a beast, he said distractions were removed from him and he turned inward, inside himself to discover God. Because God is not outside us. God has made us in His image. We already have the divine image within. Jesus says “the kingdom of God is within you.” (Luke 17:21) And that image of God shone through Fr. Roman by his sufferings, by his being a modern day confessor of the faith, that is one who calls Christ Lord and God though it will mean suffering and imprisonment."

~homily from St. Nicholas Church in MI