Say Yes to God
While I was teaching at St. Mary’s, I learned so much about the Saints and the different ways they connect with people. I have always had an interest in World War II and in particular the Holocaust. While preparing lessons and working with my students, we learned about St. Maximilian Kolbe, whose feast day was yesterday.
In short, he was a Polish Franciscan priest devoted to the Blessed Virgin Mary and spreading the Gospel through modern media in the early 20th century. As a boy, he had a vision of Mary offering him two crowns—white for purity, red for martyrdom—and he accepted both.
He founded the Militia Immaculata to lead souls to Christ through Mary and built Niepokalanów (“City of the Immaculate”), one of the largest Catholic publishing centers in the world. He also served as a missionary in Japan.
During World War II, Kolbe sheltered thousands, including Jews, from Nazi persecution. Arrested in 1941 and sent to Auschwitz, he offered his life in place of another prisoner condemned to death. He died on August 14, 1941, and was canonized by Pope John Paul II in 1982 as a “martyr of charity.”
Yesterday I sat with the story of St. Maximilian Kolbe. And the more I thought about it, the more I realized it’s not just the moment he gave his life in Auschwitz that challenges me. It’s the way he lived his life long before that.
We live in a culture that tells us “Protect yourself first.” Keep life manageable. Keep it safe.
We scroll past stories of suffering because they’re too heavy. We avoid people who might drain us. We guard our time, our energy, and even our hearts.
I do this more than I’d like to admit. But Kolbe’s life breaks right through that mindset.
In a place where every crumb of bread and every drop of strength meant survival — he gave his away. And when another man’s life was on the line, he didn’t calculate his odds or pause to weigh the cost. He simply stepped forward and said: “Take me instead.” Think about it. His heroism didn’t start that day in Auschwitz. It was built in the thousands of little choices he made before it — running a printing press to share the Gospel, starting missions with nothing but faith, choosing, over and over, to put other people’s needs ahead of his own comfort.
And it makes me wonder how many moments have I missed to step forward? Not into danger, necessarily. But into someone’s loneliness, into a hard conversation, into the messiness of loving someone I’d rather avoid.
Kolbe’s whole life was rooted in his love for the Blessed Virgin Mary. He used to say, “Never be afraid of loving Mary too much. You can never love her more than Jesus did.” And that’s where today’s feast — the Assumption of Mary — comes in.
Mary’s life was one great “yes” to God. She stepped forward into His plan while not knowing all it would cost her. She gave herself completely — and God, in turn, gave her everything, raising her body and soul into heaven.
Kolbe saw in Mary the model for our own lives: give yourself without reservation and trust that God will not be outdone in generosity. The Assumption reminds us that self-giving love doesn’t end in loss — it ends in glory. In a world that says, “Preserve yourself,” Kolbe and Mary together show us another way: “Give yourself.”
And maybe, just maybe, that’s how the divisions in our world begin to heal — one person at a time willing to step forward in love.
St. Maximilian Kolbe… pray for us.
Mary, assumed into heaven… pray for us.
