Interview with Father Constantin Hadarag
Constantin Hadarag was born in 1971 in Vaslui, Romania into a family of 15 children. He graduated from the Philosophy-History High School in Iasi, received his Philosophy degree in Milan (Italy), and received his Theology and Specialization in Mystical Theology from the Pontificia Universitas Gregoriana in Rome (Italy). After his studies, Constantin worked for about 10 years at his own construction firm in Rome. His vocation to become a priest was revived in 2009, after a 3-year period of deep reflection. At the time of the interview he was under the omophore of Bishop John Michael Botean serving as deacon at Saint John the Baptist in Detroit, MI.
Q: Can you talk about your background and how did you get to the United States?
A: In 2002, two of my colleagues and friends came to America to be ordained priests. Unfortunately, they went in different directions, but at that time I did not dare to take the step. I said I was not worthy to be a priest. I had no experience, and felt I was not ready. I finished my undergraduate studies in 2007, then during my faith conversion period (between 2006-2009) I thought to myself to ask Bishop John Michael if I would be accepted as a future priest. I was positive he would say no, but I wrote to the bishop anyway. Father Ovidiu Marginean strangely responded to me the next day – Yes, we need priests!
And so, we started this process – which was rather long. I spent three years at the monastery in Italy where I worked. I also experienced the full range of liturgical activities there and arrived in in the United States in 2013. I spent six months in the US monastery to receive the necessary formation and evaluation, returned to Rome, and finally when my time was right, I came back. I must confess, I initially did not want to come to America.
Q: Priesthood is a vocation. Have there been childhood signs of this vocation?
A: There were no special signs. My conversion was like Nicolae Steinhardt’s, a slow, gradual narration. I needed time to do things well. Since I was 4-5 years old I went to church with my grandmother, so the vocation developed progressively. I applied/signed up twice at the seminary in Neamt; they did not accept me because I was supposed to pay for it and I couldn’t afford it. In 1991, thanks to Monsignor Hossu, I was sent to study in Italy. I stayed a few years in Milan, in 1994 I came to America for six months, and then I returned and moved to Rome for theological education. Studying, I was convinced that I had a vocation, but I was scared because I realized that priesthood is an enormous responsibility when you are dealing with people’s lives. You need to know how to convey joy – if Christianity is not joy, it’s not Christianity.
From 2006 to 2009 I had moments of strong conversion – but everything happened progressively. I had ideas, insights, experienced moments of beauty, but to fall in love with Christ, the Church, life itself, took me a long time.
Q: Does this progressive unfolding of God also apply to those who do not follow the path of priesthood – for lay people?
A: Oh, yes! The frequent question I am asked is: Are you ready to become a priest? Sir, I am not prepared, but who can be prepared to follow Christ as a disciple in the priestly fashion? No one is at that level. There’s no way you can be that high. If you do not give up all your thoughts as a deacon when you are in front of the altar, you feel just as an insect. You do not feel like an insect anymore when you say: well, God knows what he is doing. I have rejected the old being; I have rejected myself and I am in front of Him. Okay, I’m a sinner, but I’m in front of Him and I’m trying to serve Him.
In my personal opinion, except in some particular cases, all metanoias, all authentic conversions are progressive. There are few exemptional cases in history. See the example of the Apostle Paul. He hit rock bottom, literally! He fell from his horse, and Christ invaded his life directly. This was not the case with me. I am a limited human being, and I needed all the time in the world to make up my mind. Then, in 2009 I told myself: if I do not decide now, then when, at age 90?
It is true for everyone, because we grow in seasons – in time, in space, having life experiences, living and working among people. I worked for more than 10 years at the Vatican in construction work. I had over 15 persons reporting to me and I worked side by side with them. The fact that I had the mark of vocation in me was manifested by the fact that at lunch and during breaks we talked only literature, philosophy and theology. We had workers who were 30-40 years older than me. It was interesting to talk about existence, about death, about the meaning of life in general. Everything is progressive – you learn from everything: reading, working, living, encountering.
A great story about Moses helped me solidify this idea. When God chose him to lead his people, Moses said, “Lord, I cannot because I stammer.” And yet God chose him. He gave him Aaron to help him because he was an orator and had other qualities that Moses did not have. That’s how I feel. I can tell God I stammer, but you have to have the courage to make the decision to be a priest.
I am a sensitive guy – if you are sad or cheerful, it becomes part of me, I feel it directly in my bones. I once asked my spiritual father. “Father Maximos, I already have my thoughts, my troubles, my shadows, my hardships, my personal psychology, if I become a priest and people come to confessions, I’ll be buried the next day.” And you know what he told me? “Constantin, it is not you, but the grace of the living Lord. It’s not about you. It is about the grace that you accept and place in your own life. It is about the One who guides you and who takes care of you.” I have been meditating on these thoughts for months and years afterwards. It is the Lord who sustains you through his grace. It’s the only way you can you go forward. You wash it all away and can be yourself through plenty of prayer.
Q: Great segue, what is prayer for you and what can it mean for the average Christian?
A: If I were to speak as a theologian, I would have to say that true prayer is when the Holy Spirit prays in you. But I do not want to sound conceited. There is a continuous red line that if you have it, you resist all vicissitudes and problems and all aspects of life – and this is having a personal relationship with God. The Holy Spirit is the one who inspires you towards this relationship – I do not know how, it just descends upon you. But there is also the other aspect of revelation, when you feel, from a human perspective that your soul is dry. In monastic language, this is called acedia – you feel that everything is sterile, everything is nonsense. Here comes the effort of humans. When you see that life does not work, even if you are in the mood, even if you are not in the mood, the constancy of prayer is the key.
The essence of prayer, because it is a personal relationship with God, is your nakedness, your nothingness, your earthliness, all that you are and you represent, what you know (and what you do not know) about you represents your direct contact with God – your telephone line, as Jean Paul Sartre says. He ironizes this thing: can you call God? Yes you can, through prayer. And there are times when you, because of the joy of life itself, fall on your knees and thank God. Meister Eckhart actually says that prayers that are truly received by God are prayers of praise and thanksgiving. God does not like the type of prayers that are similar to the Italian song, Signore, fammi fare del business, Lord, help me get some business, let me win the lottery. (laughing) That’s not prayer. For Meister Eckhart these are curses on God (mind you this is the 13th century), because practically you are trying to manipulate the creator of the whole universe – of order, of life, of existence. But sometimes, we in the liturgy also have this, we pray for the well-being of cities, villages, all who are in authority, because we are human, that’s why.
Normally, prayer should be a spontaneity of the heart, of our spirit. And we have the great Hesychastic tradition, in which you repeat to infinity the prayer of Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, be merciful to me a sinner. And you repeat it so often that even when you sleep, your own heart continues to pray it. I have not reached that level, but many times as I sleep, I dream that I pray, basically transcending the unconscious. It is the only certainty and at the same time uncertainty. It’s not rational, but for me personally it’s the only valid thing I have in my life. And especially because God listens more to the sinner’s prayer than to his saint. Because he knows the saint. (laughs) But the sinner, when he turns around, and realizes he’s wrong … that’s the marvelous thing. Unfortunately, we cannot as Meister Eckhart says to pray all the time by praising and thanking our Lord. We pray also for God to forgive us too.
But God, as I say all the time, knows what He does with us. And if you pray, it’s practically like going into your office. Prayer is a face to face encounter, it is the invocation of the presence of God, and God is always present. The problem is, we do not know this. But God knows it. Now we see, as the Apostle Paul says, in part; that is exactly why the first virtue is love, not hope or faith. I must be personally convinced of the goodness of creation and the infinite wisdom of God.
Q: How can ordinary people connect to a higher reality of prayer?
A: First of all, I’m an ordinary man. Everyone has their own sensitive points, but each one of us is part of the plan of God, thought of from the very beginning of the world. I think common sense and humility are the main things. At one point you must realize that you are limited, you are a creature and not a creator… then you connect to God through prayer, but you have to have common sense and humility.
Do you know what is dramatic about Job in the Old Testament? His case is the greatest. Job has only one defect. He places himself on the same plane as God. He does not recognize himself as creature, as a created human being. And he practically wants to contribute to creation as a God. Why then does Job puts his finger to his mouth as a sign of deep silence and say: I was blind, but now I see, after having quarreled with God, after taking God by the collar, his Creator! That is why, because we want to do it our way. Instead, what is our purpose? The goal is to understand God’s will in our lives and to be happy with what we hear, when we listen. As the great Old Testament prophecy begins, Shema Israel, “Listen O, Israel.” That’s how it starts. When God addresses Israel, it always begins like this: Listen! Similarly, for Ignatius of Loyola, one of his main teachings is to seek, to listen and to find the will of God in my life.
Q: And how can people, living in an ultra-modern society, manage to reach that level of obedience, especially because there are some who are not even aware of the existence of the divine?
A: There are no magic formulas. There are no secrets or codes. In my opinion God knows exactly what He’s doing with every one of us, and when He calls you, He’s calling you! There is also the human contribution, my personal one – that if I deny and resist it, that’s it, I refuse divine grace. But God always gives us another chance and another one, and even one more. One thing I know for sure: the humble person, the person with common sense and simplicity, the one who thinks as a peasant or a shepherd would, no matter how many university degrees they may have, that person has all the chances to wake up in this life. I am convinced of this fact. And awakening means joy. The enormous, infinite value of life – the joy to live. And Christ is pressing on this all the time – you must be joyful or blessed. A Christian cannot be a person, as Steinhardt said, grumpy, frowning, a human that seems to be possessed. Christians must be clear, serene. I don’t know how everyone can accomplish this in their own lives, only God knows, because God calls us all and gives each of us a chance.
Cardinal Lustiger wrote some very illuminating books and talks about the passage of St. Paul with the chosen vessels and the unalloyed ones, those wicked and clean ones. Steinhardt himself had a problem like this. God gives us another chance all the time – understandable to our particular language and life situation. Everyone has their own code, written in their own existence. If you just listen, and here’s the secret, you have to find it yourself, no matter how busy you are in life, no matter how many jobs you have, you have to sit with yourself, interrogate, think about yourself for a change – but in a philosophical sense, not how much money I have in my account tomorrow, or how much I gain if I do this. You have to stay with yourself, to find yourself. Without self-realization there is no salvation, without discovering you, knowing exactly what you are and how you are. This is a long process that, in my opinion, takes a lifetime. Even that would not be enough for us, the rest is the God’s grace that flows over us. You ask me some very difficult questions … I could tell you about my life, how I came to believe so much and love life and God so much.
Q: Well then, could you give me some defining examples that have tilted the balance considerably in your faith journey, that could help increase people’s understanding?
I have very many …. First of all, in 2002-2003, I earned over 50,000 Euros in two months. When I saw all that money in my pocket I said, “Constantin, are you happier now?” And I realized that nothing had changed, that I was not happier. I realized I had been busy working, and for a month and a half I never even went inside a church, I did not meditate, I did not write, I did not spend time with myself anymore. I was just busy working for 10-12 hours a day, midning my workers with their problems. Money did not satisfy me, in fact it brought me a deep dissatisfaction. There were people who were telling me, “What are you doing, Constantin? You’ve come to this life, you’ll spend 70 or 80 years, and you’re just collecting money? What is the purpose of your life? ” Therefore, money did not please me. And that was a lot of money, to gain 50,000 in two months, I was shocked, I had never gained so much, no matter how much I worked. I realized it did not bring me satisfaction, I realized that this is not my goal. And yet it took me about 6-7 years to get back to the original vocation – if you’re born with it, you cannot ignore it. Throughout this life you will discover and then identify with your vocation. Priesthood is a mission – whether you are born with it or not. Although, if I take a moment to think about it, everyone’s mission, whether you’re a lay person or not, regardless of religion, is to be happy. And nothing material on this earth can fill that void in you, only God can do that. That’s what I really believe! Nothing satisfies you, except the presence of God. Unfortunately, our condition of wearing ancestral sin does not allow us to have consciousness of God’s presence continuously in everything that we are and we do. And then, behold humanity’s effort to find fulfillment in the world… but you can get down on your knees and pray, to bring back to your memory the presence of God. In Italian, for example, the verb to remember is ricordare and comes from the Latin word cor–cordi, which means heart (or the heart of the heart), that is, return to your heart, remember in your heart. When you remember something, you practically bring back all your history, an invisible presence of what you remember. So, the center of our existence is the heart, not mind. For example, when I remember my grandmother, I remember her image in the field, at work, and I feel in my heart all that nostalgia from then.
Q: From your perspective, what does it mean to be a missionary here in the United States?
I think you are a missionary wherever you are — in your family, at work, around your friends. I remember that when I was working, I had about 15 employees and I would talk during breaks and during the workday about God and His existence in our lives. That is to be a missionary, to share your personal joy, your experience of meeting God. I would die if I did not believe in God, my life would have no meaning without Him. I believe in a God of Joy. You realize, if in this life, full of human limitations, I manage to enjoy life so much, how remarkable will be the moment after I pass to the next lift. I have no words to describe such a joy. I am already happy because I know that God takes care of me, wherever I am, when I wake up, when I go to the garden, or in church or visit someone at the hospital. I was just as glad to meet you again. God is joy, and only through His sake we can live in peace and balance! Otherwise life would not make any sense, being so short. You are forced to complete it with death.
When people have faith in God, they recognize themselves as being created in the service of God and to help each other. Whoever has faith has something special, has something extra! That is the key to our happiness. I love my wife immensely, but if there was no God in my soul, I could not love her. Because only God unites our love. It’s not enough just to stay together and get along, something is missing there: faith. It is a sign of mental health, psychologists say. It does not matter what religion you have, but if you are full of faith in the Divinity, that gives you something extra. If you do not believe you come from God and you return to God without losing your own individuality, identity, then faith is everything! Missionary means to convey, to carry on your own joy and love for God!
Q: How can believers pass on their faith to others?
A: We do not need a diploma to share our faith. We can do it through goodwill, common sense, humility, telling people that I do this for them, for free, because I’m in love with life and with God. That’s it! By your own example, if you live with God with joy and love in your life, at some point people will wonder how you can live like this … welcoming, generous. That’s how I do it. I consider everyone part of my own family. That’s what I tell my parishioners, Welcome home, dear ones! Because we are all the children of the same Father!
You can do this through simple things; you do not need any special effort or actions. People just need to be loved and be received into the family. To me that’s the secret! People can be attracted by simplicity and humility, but all these come from the love and joy of living together with God! I remember Steinhardt’s article in which he speaks about how it will be at the Last Judgment. I understood from there that God is not a sophisticated one, he always talks about the hungry, the imprisoned, the suffering, the sick, the hungry, the thirsty, the elderly. The criteria for judgment will be the simplest, Jesus is not an idealist! Not everyone is a theologian, a PhD student, an illuminated or enlightened being, but simple things are for everyone, simple things are the criterion of authenticity. You do not need any special training to know if you’re doing good or not. In morality there is a concept called natural law, you realize yourself if you do good or bad, that’s how we have been created. No matter what vocation you have, the core is this: I was sick, do you take care for me; I was in prison; did you visit me; I was naked, did you dress me; I was hungry, did you give me something to eat?! All these start in our own family. We have to be an example to others. Harmony begins from the core, and the core is us. What expectations do we have from others if we do not live in joy ourselves? I would recommend a book to read in this sense: ”Prin alții spre sine” “Through others to self” by Nicolae Steinhardt. You have to be “ok” first to share your “ok” with others! You are not a Christian if you are unhappy! This is the criterion – happiness!
Q: Currently you are a deacon that will soon become a priest. What does this stage in your life mean to you?
A: The diaconate is beautiful, especially if you take it seriously. A deacon is a servant everywhere, he serves the priest at the altar, he serves both in the church and outside the church, he serves in social settings, and in every context that is part of the Holy Church, because during this time you develop as a future priest, which is an enormous responsibility but one that offers equally great satisfactions.
On June 17, 2018 deacon Constantin was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop John Michael Botean at St. John the Baptist Church in Detroit, Michigan.