Faith, prayer and a transcendent hope in Christ sustained a Ukrainian Catholic priest amid more than a year and a half of Russian captivity and torture — and now, he is sharing his story to remind others that God “loves us and wants to save us.”
Redemptorist Father Bohdan Geleta reflected on his experiences in an hourlong interview with host Taras Babenchuk that aired Aug. 20 on Zhyve TV, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church’s television channel.
In November 2022, Father Geleta and his fellow Redemptorist Father Ivan Levitsky were seized by Russian forces from their parish, Church of the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos in Berdyansk, Ukraine.
The two — whose exact locations and conditions were largely unknown to Ukrainian and church officials for most of their 18-month captivity — were among 10 prisoners returned to Ukraine in late June. Both priests had lost significant amounts of weight, and their heads had been shaved.
Father Geleta confirmed that he and Father Levitsky had been subjected to both psychological and physical torture at the hands of Russian forces, confirming reports that Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, head of the UGCC, had received within the first weeks of the priests’ capture, which took place a full nine months after Russian troops took over Berdyansk.
The priests were abused multiple times. “I was almost never beaten during the admission, but Father Ivan was beaten so severely that he lost consciousness twice,” Father Geleta said.
The Ukrainian priest said that while he was being tortured — something “you can’t get used to” — he “remembered Jesus Christ, his cross, his suffering.”
“And such strength and grace poured in that, that I was saying: Lord, I can sympathize with you,” he said. “When they were taking me somewhere, I was already preparing internally, praying and asking God to give me strength. I did not know whether I would survive or not.”
He and Father Levitsky shared a cell for just 15 days of their 10-month imprisonment at Horlivka, where according to the priest about 2,000 prisoners of war were held.
“We had the opportunity to get to know a lot of people,” said Father Geleta. “They told us a lot, and they were looking for help from the inside, spiritual help.”
While unable to celebrate liturgy, Father Geleta said he began holding morning and evening prayer meetings of about five minutes each, reading a passage from a Russian-language Bible, reciting the Our Father and Hail Mary, and then praying for prisoners’ intentions.
“It was enough to spiritually gain such energy and go on living,” he said. “I wouldn’t say that it was some kind of propaganda or preaching, because the Our Father and the Hail Mary are common Christian prayers. … The warders didn’t even come in and see us.”
Father Geleta said he was also able to hear confessions and sensed that “the whole Church” prayed for the priests’ release.
He said his captors considered Ukrainian Greek Catholics as “sect that split from Orthodoxy,” and that the UGCC and its priests must be “eradicated, isolated from society and purified.”
“They genuinely praise God. Genuinely, yet they beat people, you know?” Father Geleta said of his captors. “It’s such religious fanaticism.”
When the June prisoner exchange was arranged, he and Father Levitsky thought they were possibly being moved to Siberia, said Father Geleta, who felt “profoundly grateful” upon regaining his freedom.
As he readjusts to freedom, Father Geleta has discerned the hand of the divine in the sufferings he and Father Levitsky endured.
“Together with Father Ivan we sympathized and bore this cross with those prisoners who fought for freedom, for a free Ukraine, for winning this happiness of not only living like people, but being close to God, to the salvation of the Lord,” he said.
“And it will probably remain there, this particle, for a lifetime, you know, as long as I live on earth,” he acknowledged.
