BEĆKOVIĆ: PROTECT SERBIAN PEOPLE, AND LET OTHERS DO THEIR JOB

BELGRADE, MAY 29 /SRNA/ - Academician Matija Bećković emphasized the significance of the message delivered by Saint Vukašin of Jasenovac and Klepac, who addressed the Ustaša soldier torturing and ultimately killing him in the Jasenovac concentration camp, stating that it was precisely his words, "Just do your job, child," that made him a saint.

Bećković told SRNA that the message of Saint Vukašin should be followed: to protect the Serbian people, and let others “do their job.”

"That is all that's left for us, and there are no more important or profound words than those spoken by an unknown man who has now become the most known, the most celebrated, and the most holy," said Matija Bećković.

He pointed out that these are "the most important Serbian words," because they made him a saint. "The rest, we can only imagine, what he looked like, the one who said those words on behalf of all of us. They now depict him in our churches as a Herzegovinian with that traditional cap on his head, but only God knows what he truly looked like," said Bećković.

Vukašin Mandrapa from the village of Klepci near Čapljina was canonized in 1998 and is commemorated on May 29 as the New Martyr Saint Vukašin of Jasenovac and Klepci.

According to the testimony of Orthodox philosopher Žarko Vidović, who was acquainted with Vukašin, this saint lived in Sarajevo from an early age until the establishment of the Independent State of Croatia. He was deported to the death camp Jasenovac in the infamous “Đurđevdan Transport,” which consisted of 3,000 detainees crammed into a train convoy several kilometers long.

The saint was subjected to the most brutal torture in Jasenovac.

The Ustaša to whom they brought him offered him his life if he shouted, "Long live Ante Pavelić!" to which Vukašin calmly replied, "Just do your job, child."

The Ustaša then cut off his ear and repeated the demand, but Vukašin gave the same calm reply. The Ustaša cut off his other ear, then his nose, and mutilated his face each time with the same demand, but Vukašin always repeated: "Just do your job, child."

In the hagiography of the New Martyr Saint Vukašin, it is mentioned that the Ustaša who killed him soon went mad.