THE COURAGE TO DIE

 “ On the Way to Auschwitz” ( Ignatius Press, 2010) by Father Paul Hamans writes:

“On the same summer day in 1942, St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein) and hundreds of other Catholic Jews were arrested in Holland by the occupying Nazis. Of those arrested, 113 (several of them priests and nuns) perished at Auschwitz and other concentration camps. They were murdered in retaliation for the anti-Nazi pastoral letter written by the Dutch Catholic bishops.”

“While St. Teresa Benedicta, canonized by Pope John Paul II in 1998, is the most famous member of this group, all of them deserve the title of martyr. They were killed not only because they were Jews but also because of the faith of the Church, which had compelled the Dutch bishops to protest the Nazi regime.

 Among them were those who, like St. Teresa Benedicta, perceived the cross they were being asked to bear and accepted it willingly for the salvation of the world.” [From the cover]

One Jewish convert to Catholicism was  LISAMARIA MEIROWSKY ( MARIA MAGDALENA DOMINIKA), born in 1904 in Graudenz,  the daughter of the dermatologist Emil Meirowsky , who opened a practice in Cologne-Lindenthal in 1908 . After graduating from high school in Cologne, she began studying medicine at the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn in 1923. In 1925 she went to Munich for two years to continue her medical studies.

 She also received her doctorate in 1933 from the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich. The title of the dissertation in the field of dermatology was “On the clinical picture of Erythema palmoplantare symmetricum hereditarium”. 

She then went to Rome, specializing  in the field of pediatrics. There she  met  the Dominican Franziskus Maria Stratmann.  She converted on the feast  St. Teresa of Avila, 15 October  to Catholicism and took the name Maria Magdalena Dominika .

In 1938, persecuted as a “ non-Aryan ”, she went to Utrecht in the Netherlands together with Father Stratmann . In October 1941 she went into hiding in the Trappist Abbey of Our Lady of Koningsoord near Tilburg , where she worked as a doctor and porter. 

On July 26, 1942, the Archbishop of Utrecht, Jan de Jong, had a pastoral letter read out against the actions of the Germans against the Jews. In response to this, on August 2, 1942, 244 former Jews who had converted to Catholicism, including Lisamaria and the siblings Edith  (St. Benedicta of the Cross) and Rosa Stein, were arrested by the Gestapo and deported.

 They were taken to Auschwitz concentration camp on August 7, 1942 and murdered on August 9.  One last letter, in which she accepted martyrdom as a granted grace from God, she addressed to her Father Stratmann.

 The Catholic Church accepted Lisamaria Meirowsky as a witness of faith in the German martyrology of the 20th century. 

In May 2014, in front of her last place of residence in Cologne-Lindenthal at Fürst-Pückler-Strasse 42, a memorial  was laid by students from a high school in Cologne.

 The April issue of Magnificat featured the  letter by Sister M. Magdalena Dominica on Thursday the 22nd (pp. 284-285). 

 

The April issue of Magnificat featured a letter by Sister M. Magdalena Dominica on Thursday the 22nd (pp. 284-285).

 You probably know that we are here and awaiting deportation to Poland. Tomorrow morning we move on. With me are two Trappists and two Fathers and a lay brother of the abbey. I want to tell you that I am full of confidence and completely resigned to God’s holy will. More than that, I consider it a blessing and a privilege to have to leave under such circumstances and in this way defend the word of our Fathers and shepherds in Christ.

If our suffering has become a little greater, our blessing is likewise doubly great, and a glorious crown awaits us in heaven. Rejoice with me. I go with courage and confidence and joy, as do also the sisters who are here with me; we are being allowed to bear witness for Jesus and to testify with our bishops on behalf of the truth. We go as children of our mother, the holy Church; we want to join our sufferings to the sufferings of our King, Savior, and Bridegroom, and to offer them in sacrifice for the conversion of many souls and thus before all else for the peace and the Kingdom of Christ.

In case I do not survive, you will no doubt have the kindness to write afterward to my beloved parents and brothers and to tell them that the sacrifice of my life was in their behalf. Convey to all of them my love and gratitude, and tell them that I ask forgiveness for every wrong and for the suffering that I have perhaps inflicted on them. Tell them also that my mother’s sister and my father’s twin sister went to the camps of Poland full of faith, trust, and resignation.

Tell Father Stratmann that he must not feel sad, but on the contrary join me in giving thanks to God for having chosen me, and sing a jubilant Magnificat. The work for peace we began together will come to consummation when, where, and as God wills it, and I shall collaborate as zealously and effectively as possible. Either through my insignificant suffering—and it is indeed nothing as compared with the eternity of joy that awaits us—or from beyond I shall always help him and stand beside him.

And now, sincere thanks for all the good you have at any time done for me, for all your merciful Christian charity. You have given me courage so often. Jesus lives in my heart and walks with us and gives me strength—he is my strength and my peace. May Mary protect you and may the love of God sanctify you always. Once again I humbly ask for your prayers and your priestly blessing.

In Jesus and Mary, Your sister M. Magdalena Dominica

Artist- Roman Halter (d. 2012) a Polish painter, sculptor, writer, architect and Holocaust survivor. He managed to escape from a cart while on a transport to Chełmno extermination camp. His mother, sister and her family died in Chełmno.