I went back to my cell and I wholly dedicated myself to reading. I had never had the opportunity to find out or read anything about the blessed starets Paisios. Once they had sent me from the Organization of the families with many children from Athens, beside the title of Honoris Causa, because I had helped the children from these families to find work in Cyprus, a book of elder Paisios, but I had given it to my mother without opening it. Reading a few pages I felt that I had been knowing him for years, he gave me power and courage and a few times he even made me laugh. I read the book twice or thrice and I felt indeed that I was living what was written there. I cried with joy…
On one of those days the consul of Cyprus from a neighboring country visited me and among others he asked me if I had any benefit from that seclusion.
My answer was: I met God, I learnt about my faith, I rediscovered myself! I told him that I had lost considerable weight. We didn’t speak quite openly because we both knew that we were under surveillance. The consul knew everything about my case and told me that unfortunately in those countries the Ministry of Foreign Affairs could not offer much help. He also told me that after the investigations made in Cyprus it was not found anything I was criminally liable for and he thought that in a short time I was to go home. He encouraged me and I am grateful to him for this.
Excerpt from the book Testimony of the religious conversion of a former convinct – Father Paisios my saint and teacher, Egumenița Publishing 2016
