Some of this week's saints

The following is taken from this week's pew sheet:

This week, the Church commemorates two saints of the twentieth century. S. Teresia Benedicta of the Cross (9^th Aug.), born Edith Stein, was a Jewish convert and a gifted philosopher, who translated Newman’s Anglican writings; she became a Carmelite nun at 42. She campaigned against Nazism, but after the arrest of all Jewish converts was ordered, she was taken to Auschwitz and sent to the gas chambers. At her canonization, Pope John Paul II declared that "as a Catholic during Nazi persecution, [she] remained faithful to the crucified Lord Jesus Christ and, as a Jew, to her people in loving faithfulness".

S. Maximilian Kolbe (14^th Aug.) was a Franciscan who sheltered refugees at his friary, among them 2,000 Jews, and condemned Nazism as opposed to religious belief, the sanctity of life, and morality. He too was arrested and taken to Auschwitz. One day, a man from his barrack was thought to have escaped (he had in fact died in an accident in another part of the camp). The deputy commander ordered that ten men be starved to death as punishment. One of them cried out in fear of what would happen to his family if he were killed; Fr Kolbe asked to take his place. He was put in a starvation cell and was eventually killed by lethal injection. The man whose place he took survived to attend Fr Kolbe’s canonization.

They remind us, firstly, that in the early Church, there was only one rule, or canon, by which Christians lived: the Canon of Martyrdom, which requires us to defend our faith to the extent that we are prepared to die for love of Him Who died for love of us. Secondly, that the saints are anything but unreal plaster statues. They are ordinary people who are prepared to deny themselves and take up their cross; who allow their lives to be changed by Truth; who practise their faith wherever they have to; who will die for love of Our Blessed Lord and His Bride, the Church.

May SS Teresia and Maximilian pray for us, that we may have the courage to bear witness to the Gospel in the world, wherever we are and whatever our circumstances.