The Heroism of St. Maximilian Kolbe

Today is the feast day of St. Maximilian Mary Kolbe, whom Pope St. John Paul II called the Patron Saint for Our Difficult Century. He is also known as the Apostle of Consecration to Mary. This is because many of his writings and teachings have to do with his love for Our Lady and his desire for all of us to consecrate ourselves to her service. Since I have fallen into the habit of taking our Sunday discussions into the history of some of these feast days, I knew that I couldn't pass up telling you about Maximilian. He is my own patron saint and proof that the Catholic Church continues to create heroic martyrs for the faith.

He was born in 1894 in Poland. During his childhood he had a vision of the Blessed Virgin who came to him. He said, "That night, I asked the Mother of God what was to become of me, a Child of Faith. Then she came to me holding two crowns, one white, the other red. She asked me if I was willing to accept either of these crowns. The white one meant that I should persevere in purity, and the red that I should become a martyr. I said that I would accept them both." (This, by the way, is not the answer I would have given!)

In 1914, he professed his final vows as a Franciscan Friar. This means that he spent his early years as a friar right in the midst of World War I. He was in Italy at the time, and there were great, anti-Catholic demonstrations against Pope Pius X, causing Maximilian to begin a Catholic magazine and prayer sodality to educate people about the Church and pray for her enemies. The magazine attained a circulation of over 1 million. Later, as the Nazis began to rise to power in Germany, he began using the radio to broadcast warnings about them. At this time he was back in his native Poland, and any fans of history know that at that time it was not considered a good career move to live in Poland, be a Catholic priest, and speak out against the Nazis.

To that last point, I would like to mention that the belief that the Catholic Church was silent, or collaborated with the Nazis is a myth. There were many courageous Catholics who spoke out against the evil they saw, many good priests who were martyred. Over 1800 Polish priests died in German concentration camps. This is just Poland alone! The Church was ferociously persecuted during this time. Kolbe, like many other Catholic priests at the time, opened up his Church as a hiding place to fleeing Jews. In his friary he hid over 2,000 people. For this crime, he was arrested in 1941 by the Gestapo and sent to Auschwitz; prisoner #16670.

At the end of July 1941, three prisoners disappeared from the camp, prompting the SS to pick 10 random men to be starved to death in an underground bunker. They did this in order to deter further escape attempts. When one of the selected men cried out, "My wife! My children!" St. Maximilian Kolbe, who not been chosen for death, stepped forward and simply said, "I am a Catholic Priest. Take me instead."

In the starvation bunker, Maximilian celebrated Mass each day and sang hymns with the other prisoners. He encouraged them by telling them they would soon be with Mary in Heaven. Each time the guards checked on him, he was standing or kneeling in the middle of the cell and looking calmly at those who entered. After two weeks of dehydration and starvation, only he remained alive. The guards wanted the bunker emptied and they gave Kolbe a lethal injection of carbolic acid. Some who were present at the injection say that he raised his left arm and calmly waited for the injection. His remains were cremated on 15 August, the feast day of the Assumption of Mary. She had fulfilled his request and given him both the white crown and the red crown.

We are in the midst of yet another harrowing century. Christians all over the world are being martyred for their faith, but we know that the gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church, and those who persevere will live forever. Let us pray for them, and ask St. Maximilian to watch over all of the precious children of God and bring us safely to heaven.