Exchanging your life for that of a total stranger
Maximilian Kolbe died in the place of a soldier, family man
By Tony Staley
Compass Editor
Someone you barely know faces certain death. You could step up and save this person's life. But if you do nothing, no one will know or think any less of you. Oh, one more thing. The only way you can save this other person is to die slowly and painfully. What do you do?
That was the choice Maximilian Mary Kolbe faced in a German prison camp in 1941. Kolbe decided to save a man's life by giving up his own. That's one reason he's a saint, although his dedication to the Christian life probably would have guaranteed his canonization anyway.
Maximilian was born in Zdunska-Wola, Poland, to Julius and Mary (Dabrowska) Kolbe. At age 10, he had a vision of Mary asking him to pick from two crowns: a white one for purity and a red one for martyrdom. "I choose both," he said, and she disappeared.
Three years later, he entered the Conventual Franciscan seminary at Lwow, Poland. He earned doctorates in philosophy and theology and also was interested in science and drew plans for rockets.
By the time he was ordained on April 28, 1918, he had founded the Militia of the Immaculata to fight evil with the witness of the good life, prayer, work and suffering. Successive popes have approved of the organization. After a dream, he started a religious magazine, Knight of the Immaculata, dedicated to teaching the Gospel. It was published in many languages and had a circulation in the millions.
To further his work, Maximilian founded "City of the Immaculate" or Niepokalanów in Poland - a town of friars dedicated to Mary. He later started a second town in Japan.
In 1939, the Nazis bombed Niepokalanów when they seized Poland. Maximilian and the other friars were arrested, only to be released three months later. In 1941, he was arrested again and taken to Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp.
One day, after a prisoner escaped, the commandant demanded revenge by executing 10 men selected at random. As the 10 were being marched to the starvation bunkers, Maximilian Kolbe, No. 16670, stepped forward and volunteered to take the place of one of the 10 - Sgt. Francis Gajowniczek, a husband and father.
In the "block of death," Maximilian and the nine other prisoners were stripped, then denied food and water. They spent their time not by screaming, but by singing.
By Aug. 14, 1941, only Maximilian and three others were still alive. When the jailer went in to kill him with an injection of carbolic acid, he found Kolbe praying in a corner. His body was burned with those of the other prisoners.
(Sources: Butler's Lives of the Saints, Catholic Almanac, Dictionary of Saints, Saint of the Day, 365 Saints)
|
