 To all his priests he spoke in their native language, and he used his name in the form of Tódor in Hungarian texts.Theodore was ordained a priest there by Bishop Aleksander Evreinov on Christmas Day, 1936 in the Basilica of St Mary Major.After completing his compulsory military service he served briefly as a pastor in several Transcarpathian parishes (part of Czechoslovakia since 1918) before being assigned as professor of philosophy at the Eparchial Seminary in Ungvár (now Uzhhorod) in 1939, by then again part of Hungary.