Maximillian Kolbe

Maximilian Maria Kolbe

(Maximillian Kolbe in 1939.)

Maximilian Maria Kolbe (whose birth name was Raymund Kolbe; Polish: Maksymilian Maria Kolbea) was born on January 8, 1894 in Zduńska Wola, Congress Poland, the Russian Empire today Zduńska Wola, Poland)

He was the second Son of Weaver Julius Kolbe (and Ethnic German) and Midwife Maria Dąbrowska (and Ethnic Pole.)

In 1907, Kolbe and his Elder Brother Francis joined the Order of Friars Minor Conventual, known as the Conventual Franciscans in Lwów, Poland (Present-Day Lviv, Ukraine.)

In June 1902 he received his First Holy Communion and on August 1907 in the Church of St. Matthew in Pabianice he received the Sacrament of Confirmation

In 1910, Kolbe to enter the Novitiate, where he chose a Religious Name, Maximilian.

He professed his first Vows to the Order in 1911, and his Final Vows in 1914, adopting the additional name of Maria (Mary).

The Franciscans sent Kolbe to Rome in 1912 to attend the Pontifical Gregorian University. While he was studying at the Gregorian, World War I broke out in 1914.

In 1915, Kolbe's Father, Julius, joined the Polish Legions, a Unit in the Austro-Hungarian Army led by Józef Piłsudski.

Julius was captured later that year by the Imperial Russian Army and was hanged as a Traitor. The news of his Father's Execution traumatized Kolbe.

Kolbe earned a Doctor of Philosophy from the Gregorian in 1915.

Kolbe then continued his studies at the Pontifical University of St. Bonaventure in Rome, where he earned a Doctorate in Theology in 1919.

In 1918, Kolbe was ordained a Priest.

In July 1919, after the end of World War I, he returned to Poland to teach at the Kraków Seminary.

The Second Polish Republic had won its Independence from the Russian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1918.

He was strongly opposed to Socialist and Communist Movements that had surfaced in Poland after the War.

In January 1922, Kolbe founded the monthly Periodical “Rycerz Niepokalanej” (Knight of the Immaculata), a Devotional Publication.

In 1922, a recurrence of Tuberculosis forced Kolbe to leave the Seminary.

From 1922 to 1926, he operated a Religious Publishing Press in Grodno, Poland (Present-day Belarus.)

In 1927 he founded a new Conventual Franciscan Monastery at Niepokalanów near Warsaw. It became a major Religious Publishing Center.

 A Junior Seminary was opened there two years later.

During the 1920s, Kolbe encountered a Group of Japanese Catholics studying in Poland.

They lamented the lack of Catholic missionaries in Japan, prompting Kolbe to consider making a Missionary Trip to East Asia.

Kolbe arrived in 1930 in Shanghai, then part of the Republic of China. However, his Mission failed to gather a following there, prompting him to move to Japan.

Kolbe soon acquired a basic literacy in Japanese.

In 1931, Kolbe founded a Franciscan Monastery, Mugenzai no Sono (無原罪の園, transl. Garden of the Immaculata), outside Nagasaki.

The Monastery soon began publishing a Japanese Edition of the “Knight of the Immaculata.”

In mid-1932, Kolbe left Japan for Malabar, then part of British India (Present-Day India), where he founded another Monastery.

In 1933 Kolbe returned to Poland for a brief period before returning to Japan.

In 1936, Kolbe returned to Poland when he was appointed Guardian of Niepokalanów.

When the Germans invaded Poland on September 1, 1939 starting World War II, Kolbe was one of the few Priests to stay at the Monastery where he opened a Hospital.

After the Germans captured Niepokalanów, they arrested Kolbe on September 19, 1939.

While in Custody, Kolbe refused to sign the Deutsche Volksliste (German People's List) since his Father had been an Ethnic German.

Doing so would have given him rights similar to those of German Citizens in exchange for recognizing his Ethnic German Ancestry, but he remained an Ethnic Pole and so was treated as such by the Germans.

The Germans released him on December 8, 1939.

After his release he continued to help those in need including sheltering 2,000 Jews and many other Catholic Poles and Ukrainian Orthodox Christians from the Germans.

(Maximilian Kolbe's Prison Cell in Block 11, Auschwitz Concentration Camp.)

On February 17, 1941, the Gestapo shut down the Monastery and arrested Kolbe.

He was incarcerated in the Pawiak Prison in Warsaw.

 On May 28, 1941, the Germans transferred Kolbe to the Auschwitz Concentration Camp where he was given the Prisoner Number 16670.

Arriving at Auschwitz, Kolbe started ministering to his fellow Prisoners while also working in the   "Babice" Commando, which worked on cutting trees and removing branches.

 He was subjected to violent harassment by the German Guards, including beatings and lashings. On one occasion, sympathetic Inmates smuggled the wounded Kolbe to a Prisoner Hospital.

On July 29, 1941, a Prisoner successfully escaped from Auschwitz.

In Reprisal, the Deputy Camp Commander, SS-Hauptsturmführer Karl Fritzsch, ordered Guards to pick ten Men to be starved to death in an underground Bunker.

When selected, Franciszek Gajowniczek, a Polish Catholic, cried out, "My wife! My children!"

At that moment, Kolbe volunteered to take his place.

Karl Fritzsch didn’t understand what was going on and said "Was will dieses polnische Schwein?" (English: What does this Polish pig want?).

While looking for a Polish-German Interpreter Kolbe translated himself by saying: "Ich will für ihn sterben" (I want to die for him.)

Fritzsch replied: "Wer bist du?" (English: Who are you?)

Kolbe said: “Ich bin polnischer katholischer Priester" (I am a Polish Catholic Priest.)

Fritzsch said: Warum wollen Sie für ihn sterben?" (Why do you want to die for him?)

Kolbe said: "Er hat eine Frau und Kinder" (He has a Wife and Children.)

Fritzsch said: "Gut" (Good) and Kolbe took Franciszek Gajowniczek’s place in the 10 to die.

An Assistant Janitor later testified that Kolbe led the Prisoners in prayer from his Prison Cell.

Each time the Guards checked on him, he was standing or kneeling in the middle of the Cell, calmly looking at those who entered.

After the Group had been starved and deprived of water for two weeks, only Kolbe and three others remained alive.

Impatient to empty the Bunker, the Germans gave the four remaining Prisoners lethal injections of Carbolic Acid.

Kolbe is said to have raised his left arm and calmly waited for it.

Maximilian Kolbe died on August 14, 1941.

He was 47 years old.

He was cremated on August 15^th which happened to be the Feast Day of the Assumption of Mary.

The cause for Kolbe's Beatification was opened at a local level on June 3, 1952.

On May 12, 1955, Kolbe was recognized by Pope Pius XII as a servant of God.

Kolbe was declared Venerable by Pope Paul VI on January 30, 1969 and Beatified as a Confessor of the Faith by the same Pope in 1971.

Kolbe was Canonized by Pope John Paul II on October 10, 1982.

(Franciszek Gajowniczek at Auschwitz in 1941.)

Franciszek Gajowniczek, the Man who Kolbe sacrificed his life for at Auschwitz was transferred from Auschwitz to the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp in Germany on October 25, 1944 where he was liberated by the Polish Army's 2nd Infantry Division on April 22, 1945.

He returned to Poland where he found his Wife, Helena, alive but his 2 Sons had been killed in a Soviet Air Raid in January 1945.

Franciszek Gajowniczek, was present as a Guest at both the Beatification and the Canonization Ceremonies for Kolbe.

Franciszek Gajowniczek died on March 13, 1995. He was 93 years old.