Sister Nyole: “All the time, they provoked me but without success. It was God's grace and not my wisdom. It was God's grace! Because when one confesses before God that he's weak, and feels it in his heart…asking God for help, while not seeking his own personal goals but the well-being of others and the Church…asking God that His truth may win against the lies and disinformation, then God will help and send us light.”
Sister Nyole: “I want to share my own experience and the importance of the Catholic faith to Lithuania. It helped us during the occupation of the Czars, the years of Fascism, and the Red Occupation. Our faith enabled us to endure and die without hate…preventing us from being locked in by barbed wire. It was due to our faith and the enlightened teachings of Christ. And it is necessary to share that with our youth, so that they will not go astray into this direction. I want to give them nourishment provided to us by the Church, our Mother.”
Sunday is a day of rest, reflection and relaxation for Sister Nyole. Quite a contrast from thirty years ago when the KGB branded her as the most dangerous criminal of Lithuania. They took her freedom and changed her life into a hell.
The Christ figure leaning on his right arm is a typical Lithuanian expression of suffering. The role of the cross with the suffering of Jesus Christ are closely linked with the Lithuanian history. At a monument of the wooden cross, Sister Nyole reflects upon her past. She is a visible example of what this cross symbolizes and commemorates. All the past attempts to destroy this cross, as well as many others, only strengthened the determination of the faithful continually to resurrect them. Faith in God was kept alive, and the suffering served only to strengthen the Church.
On the other side of the park with the monument of the wooden cross is the infamous KGB building. Sister Nyole was brought there in 1974, after having been arrested by the Soviet Secret Police. She was subsequently charged and convicted of agitation and propaganda for helping circulate copies of “The Chronicle of the Catholic Church in Lithuania.”
Sister Nyole
All the time, they provoked me but without success. It was God's grace and not my wisdom.
The building has now been stripped of the hated symbols. Just a few researchers and investigators occupy the building in an attempt to document the past. Sister Nyole was put into a cell in this building before starting a three year sentence in Siberia. Her faith was severely tested.
After her release, Sister Nyole made an even bolder stand against those who tried to crush her faith. In 1988, she was severely beaten on the street, but she survived. She can still smile and talk with love and compassion to those who have done her wrong.
Sister Nyole
Our faith enabled us to endure and die without hate.
Even to the son of the judge who sent her to Siberia. He once happened to walk by her with some friends and was astonished that she did not match the description he had heard from his father.
The Poverello Medal was awarded to Sister Nyole by the Franciscan University of Steubenville in the USA, in recognition and honor of both herself and the Lithuanian people who were willing to suffer and die for their love for God and their love of true human dignity and freedom.
