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Why is forgiving someone so difficult? How do you forgive someone when every fiber of your being resists? How do you look at them lovingly when you still have the memory of their unloving action? How can we, as Jesus tells us, forgive our brothers and sisters from our hearts? It’s certainly not an easy task.
Today we celebrate the feast of St. Maximilian Kolbe. He is the patron of journalists, families, prisoners, the pro-life movement and the chemically addicted. And forgiveness was at the core of his very being.
Maximilian was born as Raymund Kolbe on January 8, 1894 in what is now Poland. His parents were basket weavers and his father became a freedom fighter seeking Poland’s independence from Russia. While still young, his father was captured by enemy troops and hung for his efforts. Raymund could have easily followed his father’s path and joined in the resistance, yet something changed his mind and his life’s course. He had a dream that he would one day become a martyr for the Catholic faith and that he would need to live a life of purity. When he was 13 years old, Raymund joined the Conventual Franciscans. By the time he was 17, he had made his vows and changed his name from Raymund to Maximilian. He was sent to study in Rome where he was ordained a priest in 1918. Maximilian then returned to the newly independent Poland where he produced publications, hosted a radio station and founded a monastery near Warsaw.
When the Germans invaded in 1939, the monastery became a refugee camp for thousands of Poles and a hiding place for 2,000 Jews. Though they had little in supplies and meager portions, the friars shared everything they had and gained a reputation of true brotherhood. The German Gestapo soon became suspicious of Father Maximilian and infuriated by his resistance, he was sent to the Auschwitz death camp.
During his months at Auschwitz, Maximilian urged the prisoners to pray for their captors, to forgive them, to show peace to the guards and to overcome evil with good.
Maximilian Kolbe’s last act of heroism was in July of 1941. Auschwitz had a rule that if anyone attempted to escape, ten men from the same bunker would be executed. One man from Kolbe’s block went missing (it was later discovered that he drowned in a latrine). Not knowing about the drowning, the guards selected ten men from the bunker for execution. One of the men selected and cried out in dismay, “My poor wife! My poor children! What will they do?” Moved with compassion, Kolbe stepped forward and asked the officer if he could take the man’s place.
Maximilian and the 9 other men were thrown into the starvation bunker. To ease their suffering, he led the men in songs and prayers each day. Eventually, the men began to die and after two weeks only four remained. Needing the cell for more victims, the remaining four were injected with a lethal dose of carbolic acid. Maximilian was the only person conscious during the injection. He shocked those watching when he raised his arm for the injection and prayed for the executioner.
Survivors of Auschwitz tell of Kolbe’s life, his patience in suffering, his lessons of forgiveness and the joy he brought to those enduring brutal and hateful acts.
As we hear in today’s Gospel (Matthew 18:21-19:1), forgiveness saves everyone that is involved. Forgiveness has the power to transform relationships. We don’t forgive people because they deserve it. We forgive them because they need it and because we need it. We forgive in order to create the kind of world that we want to live in: one of peace, harmony, friendship and love.
So how can we forgive when it is so hard to do so? We have to come to this realization: no one ever gets to the end of their life and thinks, “I wish I stayed angry longer.” They generally say one of three things: “I’m sorry,” “I forgive you,” or “I love you.”
C.S. Lewis said, “To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.” Don’t wait until the end of your life. Forgive others now – for when we forgive, we love; and when we love, God’s light shines upon us.
