Soviet prisoner during WWII divulges testimony of faith

It was probably to my benefit that I read this book as part of a group, so I was forced to read it in small doses. Otherwise, I would have read it in one sitting.

He Leadeth Me follows the experience of Father Walter Ciszek, S. J., a Jesuit priest serving in Poland with a burning desire to minister to the people of Russia. When the Soviet Union occupied Poland in 1939, he was given an opportunity to follow Polish refugees looking for work in factories in the Ural Mountains.

Father Ciszek’s enthusiasm and journey to the Soviet Union feels something like a horror movie when the characters start splitting up. You’re a priest and this is communist Soviet Union during WWII. It’s not going to be fun.

Yet as the story unfolds, it’s clear that God’s providence reigns supreme. Now named a Servant of God (the first status on the path to sainthood), Father Ciszek was a prisoner for 23 years in the Soviet Union. Convicted of being a Vatican Spy, he spent over five years enduring solitary confinement and interrogations and another 15 working hard labor in arctic Siberia.
Ciszek brilliantly weaves his sense of God’s work in his life with the hardships he endured. Where one could be tempted to focus heavily on the torturous trials of a prisoner, Ciszek brings his hidden, interior life to the forefront, illustrating that this hidden life is in fact, the true story.

Readers journey with Ciszek from his early failures to trust in God’s providence by giving into despair and wallowing in self-pity to the heroic efforts of praying for his captors, sacrificing rest to organize secret retreats for fellow prisoners, and being a beacon of hope to fellow prisoners despite extreme and constant physical and emotional discomfort. I was especially moved to see what sacrifices and risks he took to celebrate Mass daily in secret.

I found this book both spiritually insightful and highly engaging to read. It expresses the truth of the Gospel as simple in message and difficult in practice. While explaining his purpose for creating retreat experiences for other prisoners, he writes, “Each day, every day of our lives, God presents to us the people and opportunities upon which he expects us to act. He expects no more of us, but he will accept nothing less of us; and we fail in our promise and commitment if we do not see in the situation of every moment of every day his divine will” (145).

The book is less about how to live a holy life as a Russian prisoner and more about how to live a holy life in any situation, no matter how difficult, mundane, or frustrating. There is a purpose for every life, every circumstance, and every moment, even when our plans and decisions are stripped away from us. To see how the simple message to trust and have faith in God played out in a more extreme circumstance is inspiring.

Despite all his trials, Ciszek comes to realize that “no evil could touch me, ultimately, as long as God was with me. How simple that sounds as I write it… yet it is no less true for all its terrible simplicity” (120).

Side note: If you look up He Leadeth Me online, you’ll likely find Ciszek’s first book, With God in Russia, beside it. With God is also about Ciszek’s experience during this time but focuses more on the factual, day-by-day elements rather than his spiritual insights. You don’t need to read it first or at all to find He Leadeth Me worthwhile.