Today we celebrate the 130th anniversary of the birth of St Maximilian Maria Kolbe – Franciscan, founder of the Marian movement “The Knighthood of the Immaculate”, martyr killed in Auschwitz and patron of the All-Polish Youth.

Joining the Order and evangelizing mission

Rajmund Kolbe was born on 8 January 1894 in Zduńska Wola as the second of 5 children of the Kolbe state. Rajmund's parents belonged to the 3rd Order of St. Francis (the form of the Order for lay persons), which is why they taught him Christian values from an early age. In 1907, or only thirteen years old, he began teaching in a tiny Franciscan seminary in Lviv together with his brother Francis. After 3 years, he joined the novitiate, taking the name Maximilian. Due to his advanced abilities, in 1912 he was sent to survey at the global Seraphic College in Rome, where he earned a Ph.D. in Theology. In 1914 Fr Kolbe made solemn spiritual vows and took the mediate name Mary, which is an expression of the full trust of the NMP. 2 years later, he accepted priestly ordination and celebrated his Mass in Rome. From 1930 to 1936 Maximilian Kolbe carried out an evangelization mission to Japan, where he founded, among others, a Franciscan monastery in Nagasaki.

Upon his return to Poland, he became active in public activity. In 1922 he began publishing the monthly magazine “The Knight of the Immaculate” and expanded dynamic publishing centers – first in Grodno, and later in Niepokalanów, where a monastery was built. During the highest years of the magazine’s operation, i.e. from 1936 to 1939, its circulation was up to 750,000 copies, although in any months it could exceed a million. Due to the intensive activity of the priest, the number of appointments to the Franciscan monastery grew significantly.

War and Death

During the war, Fr Maximilian was placed twice in the concentration camp. He was first arrested by the Germans on 19 September 1939 along with another monks from Niepokalanów and subsequently imprisoned in camps in Łambinowice, Gębice and Ostrzeszów.

Four months later, on the feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary Father Maximilian was released, after which he returned to Niepokalanów, where he began to prepare shelter for people displaced from Poznań Voivodeship (out of 3 1000 refugees whom he accepted, until 2 1000 were Jews). In order to rebuild the losses caused by the Germans, he opened a workshop on repair of watches and bicycles, a forge, a tailor's workshop, a metallic store and a sanitary department. On 19 February 1941, for his activity, Fr Kolbe was again arrested and deported to Pawiak, and from there he was sent to Auschwitz on 25 May.

In July 1941, erstwhile 1 of the prisoners escaped, the camp commander sentenced all tenth prisoner to starvation. erstwhile 1 of the convicts, Franciszek Gajnicznik, began to complain that his wife and children would not win without him, Maximilian made a series of requests that he could replace the unfortunate. Thus Fr Kolbe and his 9 another companions went to Block 13, called the Block of Death. Father Kolbe, who remained alive the longest, due to the fact that until a month, was killed with an injection of phenol.

Canonization