Apparently, the patriarch was forced to leave Great Britain after only two weeks. He was not inclined to go back to a country under communist rule. He wrote: "Our fate is unpredictable and a bitter one . . . I am forced to leave this country, but I myself do not know where to go or how.'' Writing later to Bishop Dionisije, of the American Canadian Diocese, the patriarch said:

Being in general difficulty, weak from illness and without means, and defeated with the general condition of our people, I cannot think or find my way. The only salvation can come to us from God, since all hope from men is pale and uncertain . . . I am presently in no condition to travel across the ocean, and, according to the advice of Bishop Irenei, I should not go to our country because, so I have been informed, I would be of no help to the persecuted Church and her people under the present circumstances there.55

The patriarch traveled from London to Rome, residing with one of his friends there. Again he wrote to Bishop Dionisije: "From our unfortunate fatherland we hear nothing good, and that which one hears more clearly is that our people find themselves in a hell, such an one unknown in our history. Only the mercy of God can deliver us from this hopeless situation into which we have been mercilessly thrown."56

Patriarch Gavrilo traveled from Italy to Czechoslovakia for reasons of health. From there he made the decision to return to Yugoslavia. He wrote: "It has been six years that I have wandered and suffered. All of this I have done without complaining of the fate which has befallen me. I am alone and exhausted. Make every effort for me to come there [to Yugoslavia] and we will share our destiny together."57

Patriarch Gavrilo arrived in Belgrade on December 14, 1946. He wrote to Bishop Dionisije again: "We are constrained so much that we can hardly breathe. We await even worse. We are restrained from printing the Herald, the Calendar, or anything else. In many regions, faith and church are destroyed. The people are fighting, but force restricts us more and more."58 Finally, on May 7, 1950, the Holy Synod announced the falling asleep in the Lord of Patriarch Gavrilo Dozic.

As for the late Bishop Nikolai, I was pleased to have had the opportunity of meeting him shortly after my arrival in the United States in July of 1948. He was residing at Saint Sava Monastery in Libertyville, Illinois, where I spent a year. It was a special privilege to be in the presence of this saintly man, to listen to him during our daily meals tell of the experiences of his life, and even to be ordained at his hand. Although the bishop never mentioned his imprisonments, we know that even the conditions at Dachau were not enough for either Bishop Nikolai or Patriarch Gavrilo to yield anything at all to the enemy.

As one considers the patriarch's pronouncement to his people on March 27, one is reminded of Tsar Lazar's words following the battle of Kosovo, five centuries earlier, which also affirmed the choice of the Kingdom of Heaven:

From Jerusalem, the Holy City
Lo, there flew a grey falcon,
And he bore a little swallow.

No, it was not a falcon;
'Twas Elijah, 'twas the holy prophet;
And he bore not a little swallow,
But a book from God's Holy Mother,
To the Emperor, from Kosovo Field;
He dropped it upon the Tsar's knees;
The book itself then began to speak to him.

"Wilt thou have the Kingdom of Heaven,
Or that of this earth?
The earthly kingdom is ephemeral,
That of Heaven, though, everlasting and eternal."

The Tsar loved the Kingdom of Heaven more
Than that of earth;
And he ordered a church built at Kosovo,
And he laid the foundation, not of marble,
But with pure silk and scarlet,
And then he ordered his army to receive
Holy Communion.