Ioan Bălan

Ioan Bălan ( born February 11, 1880 in Teiuş (Hungarian: Tövis ), County Unterweißburg, Austria - Hungary, † August 4, 1959 in Bucharest ) was Romanian Greek- Catholic bishop of the Diocese of Lugoj (Hungarian: Lugo ) in Romania.

Life

The tenth of twelve children of a farmer's family went to primary school home port and then high school in Blaj. After graduation he studied in Budapest and was ordained on July 7, 1903 Priests of celibacy. To further his studies, he traveled to Vienna. He was parish priest and dean ( Archpriest ) in Bucharest.

On August 29, 1936, he was appointed as successor by Alexandru Nicolescu, who was Archbishop of Fagaras diocese, Bishop of Lugj. He was consecrated on 18 October 1936 in the Cathedral of Lugoj by Archbishop Alexandru Nicolescu. Co-consecrators were Iuliu Hossu the Bishop of Gherla, Armenopoli, Somes - Újvár and Alexandru Rusu, the Bishop of Maramureş.

After the banning of the Romanian Greek-Catholic Church by the Communists, he was arrested on 29 October in 1948 and imprisoned with other bishops in Dragoslavele. For many years he was incarcerated or was under arrest. From 1950 to 1955 he was imprisoned in the notorious prison Sighet, put on trial and sentenced to 25 years hard labor. The judgment was now 75 -year-olds but not enforced at the, he was under house arrest until his death in the Romanian Orthodox monasteries Ciorogârla and Caldarusani, near Bucharest.

Seriously ill, he died on August 4, 1959 in a hospital in Bucharest. He was buried in the Catholic cemetery Bellu in Bucharest.