Saint Maximilian Kolbe
1894-1941
Feast: 14 August, the eve of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary
Raymond Kolbe was born in 1894 in Zduńska Wola, Poland, then part of the Russian Empire under the tsars, and grew up in the nearby small town of Pabianice. Lively, spontaneous and stubborn by nature, as a child he did not always make life easy for his mother.
One day, when he was about ten years old, he was praying to his heavenly Mother after yet another piece of mischief when the Virgin Mary appeared to him and offered him two crowns, one white and one red, symbols of purity and martyrdom, and invited him to choose. Driven by curiosity, the boy chose both.
That day the child made the brave decision to become better, day by day. Raymond was no longer the same: the Virgin had set his boundless energy on the right path. At thirteen he entered the Franciscans and took his vows under the name Maximilian Mary.
He then went to Rome to study at the Gregorian University, and there he founded the Militia of the Immaculata, which would become the great work of his life.
These servants of Mary would face the enemies of God and of the Church all their lives, especially the supporters of Freemasonry in Italy, Poland and throughout the world. Father Maximilian Kolbe also founded the monthly magazine Knight of the Immaculata and went to Japan to establish a second City of Mary near Nagasaki. He then went to India to prepare a foundation there, but tuberculosis, which had long been eating away at him, weakened his body. Recalled to Poland, he gave himself to the cause of the reign of Mary, Mother of God, with, it is said, only a quarter of a lung.
In his work of evangelization he used every kind of means, from the spoken word to radio, cinema and even the aeroplane, while always insisting that the most effective way to spread the Good News is good example, prayer and suffering offered in love. In short: showing, in everyday life, what a Knight of the Immaculata ought to be.
The Second World War found him at the head of the largest Catholic publishing house in Poland. With heroic and admirable patience and surrender, Maximilian Kolbe accepted the destruction of all his work by the Nazis. When he was sent to the Auschwitz death camp, he became a warm ray of sunshine for the prisoners.
On 14 August 1941, the eve of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, the saint died in the starvation bunker, having offered his life in exchange for a condemned man, a father of a family, Franciszek Gajowniczek.
His body was cremated at Auschwitz the next day, 15 August, the feast of the Assumption. He was canonized by Saint John Paul II in 1982 as a martyr of charity.
Among his best-known sayings:
“The power of prayer is limitless when we turn to the Immaculate Virgin, who is queen of the Heart of God.”
“Never be afraid of loving the Blessed Virgin too much, for you can never love her more than Jesus did.”
“If the angels could be jealous of men on earth, it would be for one reason only: the Holy Eucharist.”
Prepared by Rita of the Sawt el Rab team
