JPII Maximilian Kolbe june 18 1983

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Homily of John Paul II in Niepokalanów (18-VI-83)

Saint Maximilian M. Kolbe

On June 18, 1983, during his apostolic trip to Poland, the Pope visited Niepokalanów, the City of the Immaculate, a complex founded by Father Kolbe in 1927 and which had a convent, a printing press, a radio station. and a fire station. Saint Maximilian lived there from 1927 to 1930, and from 1936 (on his return from Japan) until he was arrested in 1941. In the basilica, a very popular Marian shrine, he greeted the men and women religious, and then, at Mass celebrated in the great esplanade, he delivered the following homily.

1. Cardinals, Archbishops, Bishops, priests, men and women religious, especially you, sons and daughters of Saint Francis, and all of you, dear compatriots, brothers and sisters:

On October 10 of last year I had the opportunity to elevate Saint Maximilian Maria Kolbe, son of the Polish land, to the honor of the altars of the universal Church.

It was an unusual canonization. In her there were present Poles, from Poland and from the emigration, in a considerable number. But they were only the minority of the great crowd of pilgrims, who that Sunday filled St. Peter's Square. They certainly came from Rome and all of Italy, but also in significant numbers from Germany and other European countries, as well as from other continents, in particular from Japan, which has lastingly united its hearts to the Knight of the Immaculate Conception. It was well noted that the proclamation as Saint, by the Church, of Fr. Maximiliano reached a neuralgic point in the sensitivity of the man of our time. For this reason, the wait for this canonization was universal, and the participation showed what the wait had been.

Reflecting on the motivations, it can be said that Maximiliano Kolbe, through his death in the concentration camp, in the "hunger bunker", eloquently highlighted the drama of 20th century humanity. However, the deepest and most agreeable reason seems to be the fact that in this priest-martyr the central truth of the Gospel became particularly transparent: the truth about the power of love.

Give my life for the brothers

2. "Greater love has no one than he who lays down his life for his friends" (Jn 15:13): this is what Jesus says when he said goodbye to the Apostles in the Upper Room, before heading towards his passion and death. "We know that we have been transferred from death to life, because we love our brothers," the Apostle John repeated after his Master in his first Letter (1 Jn 3,14). And he will conclude: «In this we have known charity, in which he gave his life for us; and we must lay down our lives for our brothers ”(1 Jn 3,16).

Precisely this truth of the Gospel was made particularly transparent, through the act carried out in Oswiecim by Fr. Maximiliano Kolbe. It can be said that the most perfect model that the Redeemer of the world left us was assumed in that act with total heroism and at the same time with great simplicity. Father Maximiliano Kolbe leaves the line, to be accepted as a candidate for the «hunger bunker», instead of Franciszek Gajowniczek: he made the decision in which he manifests at the same time the maturity of his love and the strength of the Spirit Santo, and carry out this evangelical decision to the end: lay down your life for a brother.

This happens in the field of death, in a place where more than four million people of different nations, languages, religions and races suffered death. Maximiliano Kolbe also suffered death: in the end, he was given the coup de grace with a fatal injection. However, in this death the spiritual victory over death was manifested at the same time, similar to that which took place on Calvary. So he "did not suffer" death, but "gave his life" for a brother. This is the moral victory over death. To "lay down one's life for a brother" means that one is, in some way, a minister of one's own death.

A testimony for the world today

3. Maximilian Kolbe was a minister: he was, in effect, a priest son of Saint Francis. He celebrated daily, in a sacramental way, the mystery of Christ's redemptive death on the cross. He frequently repeated these words from the Psalm, recalled by today's liturgy: «What can I give to Yahweh / for all the benefits and what has he done to me? / I will lift up the cup of salvation / and call on the name of Yahweh »(Psalm 115 [116], 12-13).

That's how it is. He daily raised the chalice of the new and eternal Covenant, in which, under the species of wine, the Blood of the Redeemer is sacramentally "poured out" for the remission of sins. Along with the mystery of the Eucharistic chalice, the hour of Oswiecim's decision matured in him: "The chalice my Father gave me, should I not drink it?" (Jn 18,11). And he drank, drank this chalice to the end, to bear witness to the world that love is stronger than death. The world needs this testimony, to shake off the bonds of the civilization of death that, especially in some moments of the present time, shows its threatening face.

Singular witness to the resurrection

4. In the Oswiecim event is inscribed that fundamental dialogue, which allows man to overcome the horror of the civilization of death, and allows him to overcome the different weights of temporality on a daily basis. And this is man's dialogue with God: «What can I give to Yahweh? ... / Oh Yahweh! I am your servant / your servant and your handmaid's son ”(Psalm 115 [116], 12.16).

Thus says the man, minister of the daily Eucharist, the man minister of his own death in the field of Oswiecim. So says the man. This is one word that sums up his entire life.

And God responds with the words of the Book of Wisdom. These are the words that contain God's answer: «The souls of the righteous are in the hands of God, and torment will not overtake them ... God tested them and found them worthy of Himself. Like gold in the crucible he tasted and they were accepted as a burnt offering ”(Wis 3,1.5-6).

Is it really so? Did not "torment really catch up" with Fr. Maximiliano? The man we venerate precisely as a martyr?

The reality of death in martyrdom is always torment; But the secret of that death is that God is greater than torment. The test of suffering is great, "to taste like gold in the crucible" is hard; But stronger is the proof of love, stronger is grace: "The love of God has been poured into our hearts by virtue of the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us" (Rom 5,5).

Thus, in front of us we have a martyr: Maximiliano Kolbe - minister of death himself - strong in his torment, but even stronger in his love, to which he was faithful, in which he grew up throughout his life , in which he matured in the field of Oswiecim. Maximiliano Kolbe: a singular witness to the victory of Christ over death. A singular witness to the resurrection.

Servant of Mary Immaculate

5. «Oh Yahweh! I am your servant, / your servant and your slave's son ... ».

This maturity in love, which filled the entire life of Fr. Maximilian and was fulfilled in a definitive way on Polish soil through the act of Oswiecim, that maturity was especially linked to the Immaculate Servant of the Lord.

He was, like few others, spiritual son "of your slave." From his earliest youth, he experienced her spiritual motherhood: the motherhood that was constituted on Calvary, at the foot of the cross of Christ, when Mary accepted as her son the first disciple of Christ.

Maximiliano Kolbe, like few others, had been penetrated by the mystery of the divine election of Mary. His heart and his thoughts were concentrated in a particular way around the "new beginning", which was in the history of humanity - through the work of the Redeemer - the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of his earthly incarnation. «The meaning of Mother - he wrote - we know, but that of Mother of God we cannot understand with intelligence, with limited mind. Only God himself perfectly understands what “Immaculate” means ... The Immaculate Conception is full of consoling mysteries »(M. Kolbe, Letter of April 12, 1933).

Maximilian Kolbe penetrated this mystery in a particularly deep, particularly synthetic way: not in an abstract way, but through the living context of God-Trinity, God who is the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, and through the living context of the God's saving designs for the world. Let us hear her words again: «Let us seek more and more, each day more, to get closer to the Immaculate Conception; in this way we will get closer and closer to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, to God the Father, to the entire Holy Trinity, because no creature is so close to God as the Immaculate One. In this way we will also bring all those who are close to us in heart to the Immaculate Conception and to the good God »(M. Kolbe, Letter from Nagasaki, April 6, 1934).

All the apostolic initiatives of Fr. Maximiliano Kolbe bear witness that the mystery of the Immaculate Conception was at the center of his conscience. The "Militia of the Immaculate Conception" and the "Knight of the Immaculate Conception" testify to this. The Japanese "City of the Immaculate" (Mugenzoi no Sono) testifies to this. Finally, our Polish "Niepokalanów" testifies to this.

6. It is good that we met here, precisely after the canonization of Fr. Maximiliano. Already, after his beatification, our great assembly in his native land took place in Oswiecim: it was an emotional ceremony. Oswiecim is indeed the place where he "gave his life for a brother." Today we are here in Niepokalanów, and Niepokalanów tells us about the discovery of the "new beginning" of God's humanity. Niepokalanów is the place where, in continuous obedience to the Spirit of truth, following the example of the Immaculate Conception, man was being formed day by day, so that the Saint surpassed man not only in terms of life and apostolate, but also as a function of a martyr's death "for the brother."

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