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Catholic Saints
St. Maximilian Kolbe
00:25:30
At age twelve, St. Maximilian Kolbe received a vision of Our Lady where he accepted the crowns of both purity and martyrdom, vowing to promote devotion to Mary as the defense against the twentieth century's evils. Join Dr. Sean Innerst and Dr. Ben Akers as they dive into the life of this modern martyr killed in Auschwitz to spare the life of a husband and father.
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Host
You're listening to a podcast on Catholic Saints. This podcast is produced by the Augustine Institute, an apostolate helping Catholics understand, live, and share their faith.
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Ben Akers
Hello. Welcome to Catholic Saints, the show where we have a conversation about Catholic saints, heroes and heroines of our Catholic faith through the 2000 year history of the faith. And today we're. Today we're talking about St. Maximilian Colby, one of the best known saints of our modern era. I know so many children named Max or Colby. Yeah, exactly. And I think because of his great inspiration. My name is Ben Akers and I work here at the Augusta Institute along with my colleague, Dr. Sean Eneris, who's a great professor in our Catholic graduate school here. Sean, thanks for joining me today.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
You bet, Ben. Great to be here.
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Ben Akers
Maximilian Colby. So he's born in 1894, dies in 1941. Just to kind of give our viewer. If you haven't heard of this great saint context, where should we start? There's so many wonderful things to talk about.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Oh, man.
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Ben Akers
With Colby.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
As a matter of fact, I think people don't often appreciate how important a cultural figure he is. You know, and when he appears in church, history is a period of particular foment. You know, obviously St. John Paul referred to him as the patron of our difficult century.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Referring to the 20th century. And there's so much in that statement, it's almost hard to unpack. Obviously, he finds himself at the very central event, World War II, a victim of that conflict, kind of iconic, of the whole world of victims that were caught up in that meat grinder, which was that horrible world war. But there's so much in Colby that reaches back in time to the century prior and represents a kind of prophecy of what might possibly come. And so there's. So he's really an immense figure, I would say, of the stature of John Paul himself.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
In terms of the import of his life, his spirituality. I think it'll take us really some more time to recognize the significance of Saint Maximilian Kolbe, but that's saying a.
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Ben Akers
Lot, what I'm saying. That's a beautiful intro. I really do. So he is born into a Catholic family in what is modern day Poland, but I don't think it was Poland at the time.
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Guest 1
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
It was under Russian control, so it was part of the empire of Russia at the time. And his father actually ended up being killed because he transgressed the loyalty they were supposed to have for Russia. And he ended up dying as a fairly young man in one of the conflicts that were Raging across those borders in those days. It was a very complicated political situation. But, yeah, so once again, it's a point of confluence, right. The struggle between Russia eventually becoming the Soviet Union, Germany, all the events that are happening in that cauldron, which is central Europe at the time. But also, once again, as we said, the cultural influences at the time, you know, the issues of Marxism, Hegelianism, all those philosophical currents, the problem of freemasonry, which was sort of a particular thing which he felt he had to oppose. And his particular way of throwing himself into the struggle against these world historical movements is really quite dramatic. Once again, a simple Franciscan living in poverty, but very much a man, a modern man in many ways.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Ben Akers
One of the things that I was struck by was just how creative he was in trying to get the gospel to defend the faith against those who would accuse it of people that are Catholic, of being simplistic or an ancient faith that's not relevant today, but also winning new souls and being missionary, going to Japan and India, trying to win Catholics. But he's using modern. The means of communication that were available to. He's making a newspaper. He builds a city to try to, like, you know, to let's gather together and live together and live the faith. Yeah, but newspapers, radio. Yeah, I think he did theater, almost like a John Paul ii.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah, that's right. That's right. So once again, he had an avidity for souls, and he wanted to use all the tools at his disposal and that, you know, modern culture was making available in order to advance that aim. And he had a very broad reach. You know, Poland is a Catholic country.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
So it wouldn't surprise us necessarily that hundreds of thousands of copies of his magazine are circulating throughout the country. You know, and this is coffee table stuff, you know, if they have coffee tables, I don't know, in Poland at the time. So he's getting into living rooms and, you know, and on people's radios, and he's looking for ways to advance the gospel in his particular Franciscan Marian devotional approach to opposing these cultural currents that we've been talking about. And he was very effective at it. And as you said, he built a city, right. Nipikawanov, which is basically City of the Immaculate. And of course, that's his central concern. He comes at Franciscanism from a particular devotion to the Immaculate Conception. So he builds the city of the Immaculate. It's home to the largest monastic community in the world at the time. And even in the way in which he approached religious life among the Franciscans he was particularly kind of modern in his outlook. For example, he would get his fellow friars out and have them do jumping jacks in the morning, for example.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
So they. Yeah, the importance of being physically fit and, you know, able to do the work they're given to do. So it wasn't kind of this sort of frail, you know, approach to, you know, Christian religious life.
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Guest 1
Right.
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Ben Akers
Well, because he calls his group the Militia Immaculate. So even like a very soldier oriented.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah, that's right. So, yeah, the Militia Immaculate.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Really means the army of the Immaculate. And he was moved to respond in that way because he was seeing the militancy of the forces on the other side. He started the MI.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
In 1917 as the Freemasons were protesting outside the Vatican.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
And he was in Rome studying at the time and was so disturbed by what he saw because apparently they had a large panel with Satan trampling down St. Michael the Archangel. Oh, wow. So the very reverse of the typical Christian iconography and claiming that they were going to destroy the Church. And once again, interestingly, his particular response was not a political one.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
And even, although he's very adept at using the cultural tools, a cultural one, it was particularly a devotional one, a movement of piety, the idea being to, you know, to employ the power, the intercessory power of Our lady to trample down these forces of evil which were abroad in the world. And once again, we don't often recognize the significance of this because there were two things happening at the same time in the century prior.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
You have Marxism and even a century before that, Freemasonry beginning to rise, and all the cultural influences of, you know, religious indifferentism, what we call Modernism, was beginning to come to the fore. And at the same time that Pius ix, for example, Pio Nono, Blessed Pio Nono, because he's been beatified, was responding to those philosophical issues and theological issues. He also declared the dogma of the Immaculate conception.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
In 1854, just around the time when all these forces are coming into play. And I think Blessed Pius, Pope Pius ix, recognized that this declaration of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception was one of the ways in which the Church would arm herself against this onslaught. And Kolbe seemed to have had a clear intuition, a spiritual intuition, which may have begun already at the age of 12, because apparently in a vision of Our lady at the age of 12, that our lady was the means by which these forces would be opposed in the modern world.
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Ben Akers
That's beautiful to mention that vision. I remember Growing up, the first time I was introduced to Maxim Colby, there was a. I think it was a Marvel comic book. I think it was Marvel. They did one on John Paul ii. Yeah. And on Maximilian Colby. And I remember the. It tells the story of our lady appearing to him when he's 12 years old and offering him two crowns, one white and one that's red. One for the white for purity and the red for martyrdom. And said, which one would you like to wear? He said, both.
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Guest 1
Yeah, that's right.
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Ben Akers
I want both.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Must've looked kinda odd he had to.
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Ben Akers
Wear both on top. But I mean, this is, you know, he lives that clearly, the purity and singleness of heart in his life. But then we also know how the story ends with his martyrdom.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah, that's right. And obviously that was prophetic and in an odd way, because one of the controversies at the time, this was also the case he was beatified by Paul VI in 1971, and Paul VI had said. Had given him the title of confessor of faith, which is given to those who make great sacrifices for the faith but don't die for it. But it also referred to him as a martyr of charity, so kind of slipping him under the martyrdom category. And St. John Paul, when it came to. To his canonization, really embrace the martyr of charity part, which is the red crown that he was offered at age 12. And I think he was probably moved by that vision that Saint Maximilian had had, thinking, look, our ladies already said it's both white and red, so we should go all the way and declare him a martyr for the faith, even though he had really died as an act of love for a fellow inmate in Auschwitz and taking his place in the. In the starvation bunker.
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Ben Akers
Yeah, let's fast forward to that. So he's. He's in Japan, health reasons, and he's, you know, doing incredible work over. Yeah, Nagasaki is one of those.
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Guest 2
Yeah, that's right.
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Ben Akers
He's working. He, because of health reasons, has to return to Poland.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
So I think this. It's interesting how the Lord in his providence sometimes moves us to places that we don't always expect, but for his goodwill. And in fact. So he goes back to Poland and he's resisting the Nazi regime as much as he can.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah, he is.
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Ben Akers
I think he's arrested and then spent some time in prison, then came out and they kept refusing to comply.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah, yeah, he would not comply. And actually, even though most of the monks had left his city of the Immaculate.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
I think there were only four of them. Left. He turned it into a hospital to care for the needy, and he ended up actually housing Jews.
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Guest 1
Wow.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah. So there were, I think, 2,000 Jews went through that place.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
In an attempt to protect them from the Nazi regime. There were some claims later, actually, because of some of the things that he had written, that he had an anti Semitic streak.
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Ben Akers
This doesn't seem.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah, this doesn't fit. And he was asked specifically, you know, should we help the Jews? And he said, we're all brothers.
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Guest 1
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
So it puts the lie to that claim very, very clearly. And he apparently could have escaped because his name was Kolbe, which is German, not Polish.
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Guest 1
Okay.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
His mother was Polish, his father was German, and he could have claimed his German heritage and sort of escaped, you know, the. The predations of the Nazis, at least in some measure. But he refused to do that because he, you know, he. He continued to publish against Nazi ideas and. And proposing, you know, the faith and once again, also acting in the favor of. Of his Jewish brothers. So. So he was fated right. F. First to be imprisoned, then to be sent to Auschwitz.
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Ben Akers
So he's sent to Auschwitz, and he's there for a couple months. I think they give him the hardest and the dirtiest jobs of cleaning up terrible things, but caring for the bodies and cremating them. And a prisoner escapes. So for those who don't know the story, a prisoner escapes, and as punishment for the whole camp to send a message, I think, is it nine or 10?
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Dr. Sean Eneris
10.
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Ben Akers
I think 10 men will be replay to replace the one that escaped.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
And famously, somebody else. He's not picked.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
After 10. But I think it's a man named Francis.
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Guest 1
Yeah, that's right.
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Ben Akers
Which is interesting. He's a Franciscan. Brother for a brother. And that he. And. And who says, I have a wife and family, you know, immediately protests and Maxim and Colby famously, you know, take me.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
I'm an old man. Let him live. He has a wife. And.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah. And I think the commandant said something like, you're a priest. And Kolbe said, this is what a priest is for.
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Ben Akers
Well, to lay down your life for another. So he's put into a starvation bunker, and I think he's leading the other soldiers and exhorting them, encouraging them to face death, praying and singing.
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Guest 1
Singing. Yeah.
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Ben Akers
That's beautiful.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah. So apparently some of the witnesses, you know, said that you could hear, you know, that the voices of those who were starving to death in the bunker, singing at the. You know, at the behest of Father Colby. And I guess a Guy who was working in the camp as a janitor was able to see what was going on in there and testified that whenever they opened the door, he was either standing in the midst of them, leading in prayer or singing or kneeling in the midst of them doing the same. So a remarkable picture of fortitude. And he had been found to have tuberculosis as a young man. So he wasn't physically strong. He had always struggled with. With, you know, various illnesses, but there he was in the midst, apparently holding up pretty well by God's grace.
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Ben Akers
So two weeks go by, he's the last alive. I think there were there a couple. Okay.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
There were four, I think, in the end, who were still hanging on.
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Ben Akers
And so they. They accelerate the death.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
Inserting acid.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
Carbolic acid in there.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
And I guess they needed the space for somebody else.
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Guest 1
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
But the testimony is that he extended his left arm to receive the injection. He's patron of drug users, by the way.
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Ben Akers
Oh, because of a needle in the arm.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Because of the needle in the arm, yeah.
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Guest 1
Oh, wow.
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Ben Akers
What an inspiration to overcome that. Is that for real? But when they found the body, it looked as if he was in ecstasy. His eyes were fixed. Yeah, his eyes were open.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
And fixed at some certain point. Maybe a mystical vision at the end of his life.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
Absolutely fitting, but wouldn't be surprising. I've been able to. I've been blessed to be able to go to the place he died.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Oh, wow. I haven't.
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Ben Akers
So when my wife and I were blessed to go to Auschwitz. But it was. It was in November and it was. It had snowed.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
So it was a very eerie and distressing day. Depressing day because it was this camp. And these buildings are just like kind of normal buildings if you didn't know what was going on. It's covered in snow. But then you enter the horror of the concentration camp and in particular, his cell. And it was just dank and dark and dirty and nasty. And it was really just the lowest of the low in the midst of human hatred towards others. And he shines as this bright light of laying down his life for his brother.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
And cremated on the Feast of Our Lady's Assumption.
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Ben Akers
Right. Because he dies on the eve of her feast day, August 14, which is his feast day. So if you like to celebrate August 14th as his feast day. What a beautiful gift I'm sure Our lady gave him.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
To be with her in heaven on her feast day.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
There are a number of places where she promises that to those who are devoted to various aspects of the mystery of Mary, you know, her seven sorrows, for example. She promises to be there at the moment of death for those who are devoted to her in that way.
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Ben Akers
Well, I remember reading that one of his last words from a witness was hail Mary.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
And then at the Hail Mary, we do pray now and at the hour of our death.
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Guest 1
Yeah, that's right.
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Ben Akers
At a particular moment that now and hour of death will be the same.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
And for him it was. How do you see his death fitting in with that, you know, that beautiful kind of painting of the historical scene in which we are relate to that? Well.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
It'S a martyrdom of charity.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
A victimhood which represents, I would say, the victimhood of that century.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
I think that's what St. John Paul was getting at. That Maximilian Kolbe. His faith, his hope, his love, his endurance in the face of opposition is a kind of icon of what we're called to do. And specifically, not just political or cultural resistance, which is part of what it means to be a Christian.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
We're supposed to be engaged in the world and advancing the kingdom in its various expressions in the world, but not so much through political or cultural commitment, but through consecration.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
And that was his response, as I said before, to these anti Christian forces in the world. And there were people who were taking up arms in opposition in some cases that would have been obviously in opposition and resistance to Nazi. Right. The Holocaust of the Jews. That's not something to which we would be opposed.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Taking up arms and resistance of that kind. But his particular gift to the modern world is the paradigm of resistance through consecration rather than mere political resistance, that we have to call upon forces which are superior to those powers which are in the world. And that's the ultimate formula for victory in the end. And that's what his death represents. Right. Victory over suffering, victory over victimhood.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Victimhood transformed into Christus victus.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Christus Victor. Christ is victorious even in. In this. Even at this level of degradation.
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Ben Akers
It's the. That's beautiful. The. The thing that they. That they couldn't resist and take. What was his dedication? Consecration. Our Lady.
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Guest 1
Yeah.
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Ben Akers
And in the face of hatred, one of the quotes that's attributed him is also the hatred is not a creative force, but love is a creative power.
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Guest 1
Yeah, that's right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
That's right.
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Ben Akers
The only answer to that ultimate hatred and violence was actually to lay down, like what Christ does on the cross, really crystal form in his life.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So he's a remarkable individual. And as I said, you know, I have to admit I haven't really explored this very much, but, you know, what we see at Fatima and what we see in Kolbe.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
So, you know, Fatima is our Ladies peace plan, typically so called.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
And in a certain sense, I think Kolbe represents the way in which to enter into that fully.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Through Marian consecration, and particularly to the Immaculate, to whom this age has been given, in a certain sense, all the way back to 1854, who in herself represents the church in perfection, the possibility of Christian life in complete gift of self to Christ and conforming ourselves to his victimhood for the purpose of advancing the redemption, the completed redemption in Christ, which yet needs to be fully expressed in the life of Christians.
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Ben Akers
That's beautiful. Anything else that you'd like to share with the viewer or the listener about Max Van Colby's life or devotion to him?
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Guest 1
Well.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
Get his consecration to the Immaculate Conception.
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Guest 2
Right.
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Dr. Sean Eneris
When I first made the consecration to Our Lady, I used de Montfort, and that was back in 1989. And a few years later, I discovered Maximilian Kolbe and I made the consecration, renewed my consecration to Jesus through Mary, using his formula, through Marytown, which is in Libertyville, Illinois. It's a place where. Which has become, I think, a Colby and shrine. And I have to say, from that point forward, my life completely changed. So when I discovered Our lady and made the consecration, so many of the spiritual struggles that I had faced began to get easier and life changed for me. I think I became a full Catholic Christian through consecration, I would say. And figures like de Montfort and Colby, I think are important figures for our time because they introduce us to this deeper Marian reality in the life of the church, which is not an extra added dimension, but really of the essence, as the catechism says. And so that aspect of his life, I think, is the critical element, the critical key, and that which the church encourages us to see in him and to continue in our own lives.
- [24:28]
Ben Akers
Can't get a better endorsement than that. So thank you. Yeah, that's a great challenge point for you is if you haven't done the consecration to Our Lady. Damon Ford has one, the classic Maximine Kolbe building off of that as well. But thank you, Sean, for your thoughts about Maxwell and Colby and thank you for joining us. You can find these, this and other stories that we have, conversations we have about Catholic saints on also where you find your podcasts. Thank you and God bless.
- [24:56]
Host
You can watch these interviews in video format by visiting form.org formed is an online Catholic streaming service created by the Augustine Institute and Ignatius Press, with award winning studies and parish programs, inspiring audio content, movies, ebooks and family friendly kids programming to support the mission of the Augustan institute. Please visit missioncircle.org.