August 14 + Saint Maximilian Kolbe

Maximilian Maria Kolbe was born as Raymund Kolbe on January 8, 1894, in the Kingdom of Poland, which was part of the Russian Empire. He was a Polish Conventual Franciscan friar and a martyr in the German death Camp of Auschwitz during World War II.

Maximilian was very active in promoting the Immaculate Virgin Mary and is known as the Apostle of Consecration to Mary. Much of his life was strongly influenced by a vision he had of the Virgin Mary when he was 12.

"That night I asked the Mother of God what was to become of me. 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."

One year after his vision, Maximilian and his elder brother, Francis joined the Conventual Franciscans and in 1911, he professed his first vows.

At the age of 21, Maximilian earned a doctorate in philosophy and he also earned a doctorate in theology by the time he was 28.

Maximilian saw religious indifference as the deadliest poison of the day and his mission was to combat it. He founded the Militia of the Immaculata, whose aim was to fight evil and work for the conversion of sinners. He dreamed of and then founded Knight of the Immaculata, a religious magazine under Mary’s protection to preach the Good News to all nations. For the work of the publication, he established a “City of the Immaculata” which housed 700 of his Franciscan brothers. He later founded another one in Nagasaki, Japan. Both the Militia and the magazine ultimately reached over one million members and subscribers. His love of God was daily filtered through devotion to Mary.

In 1939, the Nazis overran Poland with deadly speed. Niepokalanow was severely bombed. Maximilian and his friars were arrested, but then released in less than three months, on the feast of the Immaculate Conception.

In 1941, the monastery was shut down and Maximilian was arrested by the German Gestapo and taken to the Pawiak prison. The Nazis’ purpose was to liquidate the select ones, the leaders. Never abandoning his priesthood, Maximilian was the victim to severe violence and harassment. Toward the end of his second month in Auschwitz, men were chosen to face death by starvation to warn against escapes. Maximilian was not chosen but volunteered to take the place of a man with a family.

Survivors of the camp testified that the starving prisoners could be heard praying and singing hymns, led by the priest who had volunteered for an agonizing death. After two weeks of dehydration and starvation, on the night before the Church's Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the camp officials decided to hasten Maximilian's death, injecting him with carbolic acid.

Maximilian Maria Kolbe's body was cremated by the camp officials on the Feast of the Assumption. He is the Patron Saint of drug addicts, prisoners, families, and the pro-life movement.