"IN LUBIANKA'S SHADOW"
The Memoirs of Fr. Leopold Braun, A.A., edited by G.M. Hamburg

By Norman Meiklejohn, A.A.

"In Lubianka's Shadow" is a very challenging book. It's about the Assumptionist, Fr. Leopold Braun, and his memoirs of twelve years spent living and working in Moscow, across from the headquarters of the secret police of the Soviet Union. The book begins with a lengthy introduction (70 pages, plus 15 pages of footnotes). This introduction is not a biography of Fr. Braun, but rather a study of the seventeen years Fr. Braun spent, after his return from Moscow, trying unsuccessfully to persuade his superiors to allow him to publish his memoirs. He was refused permission, repeatedly, out of fear that his revelations of religious persecution in the Soviet Union would make life impossible for the Assumptionists who replaced him at St. Louis Church and at the American Embassy. It was feared also that their publication would have a negative effect on various efforts, by the Church and the U.S. government, to contain the Soviet Union.

The memoir itself takes up 311 pages of rather small print, and 30 pages of appendices. Extremely interesting to read, the story of Fr. Braun's sojourn is also very demanding on the reader because it reads at times like a seemingly unending suspense novel. Imagine being the only functioning minister of religion in a city where those in power are determined to stamp out, by all means conceivable, all traces of religious “superstition” that Fr. Braun represents. It's a cat and mouse struggle where the mouse matches wits with an entire secret service of cold cats, and even some western diplomats. He manages to outwit them all.

Fr. Braun was a professor of German at Assumption College in 1933 when he was asked to be the first minister of religion to take advantage of the Roosevelt-Litvinov Entente of 1933. Fr. Braun's assignment was to serve as aide to Bishop Pie Neveu, A.A., Pastor of St. Louis Church and Apostolic Administrator for all Catholics in the entire Union. (All other bishops and priests were, or would soon be, either exiled or imprisoned.) He was also to serve as chaplain for any of the staff of the American Embassy who would request his services. In less than a year, the Bishop had returned to France for badly needed medical attention (he had been working in Russia uninterruptedly since 1934) and was never allowed to return. Thus Fr. Braun was to live alone and minister also to all the Russian Catholics, and even the Orthodox believers, who asked for his services. Besides celebrating all the sacraments at the church, he also frequently went on house calls, in and around the city, and did committal services in many nearby cemeteries.

He was made aware from the very outset that the Soviet Government would try to entrap him in all sorts of ways and so have an excuse for expelling him from the country. Fr. Braun had a remarkable gift for languages.  He already mastered English, French, German and Spanish, and soon was perfectly fluent in Russian. This allowed him to anticipate many of the moves against him, and often to pass as a Russian citizen, or a citizen of any other country he chose. During almost the entire time, he resided at the French Embassy. During the Second World War, he had to fend for himself and he managed to survive without any legitimate access to food or firewood or gasoline or shelter. It should be stated that Fr. Braun would not have been able to survive without the aid of his parishioners who often were able to warn him about various maneuvers to entrap him. He also received assistance from some diplomats, and especially those from the Turkish Embassy.

I was only superficially acquainted with Braun, and like many others, found him overwrought, even paranoid. After reading his memoirs, I can understand his paranoia. What is more, I have developed a tremendous admiration for the man and for the priest he was. I spent thirteen years (1986-1999) ministering to foreign Catholics in Moscow, and the going wasn’t ever easy. But it was “Easy Street” compared to Fr. Braun's experience. What utter dedication to the people he was called to serve! What strength to be able to survive the awful tension of being ceaselessly under scrutiny by the secret service, knowing that they were always seeking ways to do him harm as well as to anyone who came to him for his religious services! What intelligence, cunning, and chutzpa to be able to take on the NKVD, and then the KGB, and survive. When I got to know some of his surviving parishioners, who had spent time in the gulag because of their acquaintance with him, they told me how much they venerated him. "He was a saint" I thought their sentiments were excessive. On reading his memoirs, I fully agree with them. And I also tip my hat to him for his comportment and longsuffering on his return, and his untiring, though fruitless, efforts to alert the Western World to the reality that was the Soviet Union.