Flora Cantábrica

-EDITH STEIN,English 10.12,21

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-EDITH STEIN

 

I only wish that death finds me in a secluded place, far from all dealings with men, without brothers in habit to direct; without joys to console me, and tormented by all kinds of sorrows and pains. I have wanted God to test me as a servant, after He has proven in the work the tenacity of my character; I have wanted him to visit me in sickness, as he has tempted me in health and strength; I have wanted him to tempt me into disgrace, as he has done with the good name that I have had before my enemies. Deign, Lord, to crown your unworthy servant’s head with martyrdom. «

 

SANTA TERESA BENEDICTA DE LA CRUZ

-EDITH STEIN

 

She was Jewish by birth, she embraces the Catholic faith as a university professor and renowned philosopher. She enters the Carmelitas barefoot and dies a victim of the Nazis in Aushwitz. Canonized by John Paul II on October 11, 1998

 

He considered his conversion to the Catholic faith as a conversion also towards a deeper identification with his Jewish identity.

 

His testimony illustrates two inseparable themes: The unity between Judaism and the Catholic faith and the value of suffering.

 

«St. Edith Stein saw in the holocaust an aspect of atoning suffering … a redemptive value for the whole world (and) a specific link between its sacrifice and the special grace necessary to bring about the conversion of the Jews» Salvation is from the Jews by Roy Schoeman.

 

Teresa Benedicta de la Cruz,

 

(Edith Stein) – Biography

 

She was born on October 12, 1891, in the then German city of Breslau (today Wroclaw-capital of Silesia, which came to belong to Poland after World War II).

 

She was the youngest of the 11 children of the Stein couple. Her parents, Sigfred and Auguste, dedicated to commerce, were Jews. He died before Edith was two years old, and her mother had to run the business and educate her children.

 

Edith wrote of herself that as a child she was very sensitive, dynamic, nervous and irascible, but that at the age of seven a reflective temperament began to mature in her. She would soon stand out for her intelligence and for her ability to be open to the problems around her.

In full adolescence he leaves school and religion because he does not find meaning for life in them. He has great existential doubts about the meaning of life for men in general, and he realizes the discrimination suffered by women. From there he begins the search for it, motivated by a single principle: «we are in the world to serve humanity.»

 

She was a brilliant student of phenomenology, at the University of Gottiengen. Husserl chooses her before Martin Heidegger (one of the most important philosophers of the 20th century) to be her assistant professor. As a woman, at the time of 1916 this was an impressive achievement. Starting from a personality strongly marked by determination, tenacity, stubbornness and self-confidence, she received a degree in Philosophy from the University of Freiburg

Being a woman with a high-tension and strongly passionate personality, as well as totally rationalist and atheist, at the very bottom of her heart, the seed of generosity and service to humanity caused a deep existential questioning. It was thus that she decided to enlist in the Red Cross as a nurse during the First World War. His words were: «Now my life does not belong to me. All my energies are at the service of the great event. When the War ends, if I am still alive, I will be able to think again about my personal affairs. If those in the trenches have to suffer calamities, why should I be privileged? «

 

All this reveals the search for a good soul, a soul that at that time did not know God but that, nevertheless, in the face of the suffering of others, becomes supportive. In 1915 she received the «medal of valor».

 

Other human characteristics of her character shone through in that period: her kindness, peace, silence, service, and self-control. Everybody loved her. God was already preparing her soul to one day reign in her.

 

The Moment of Conversion

 

In 1921, after the death of a very close friend of hers, Edith decides to accompany her widow, Hedwig Conrad, who is also a close friend of hers. Edith thought that she was going to meet a woman totally heartbroken over the loss of her husband so dear to her. Her death always caused a great inner impact on him, because she made him feel the urge to answer the great questions in her life. At this moment in her life, she was already living a certain kenosis internally, for she had experienced the emptiness of the aspirations of philosophical ideas. They were not capable of filling her soul, nor of calming her desire for a deeper, more complete truth. She recognized that there were large voids and gaps in them. Edith was looking for more.

 

It was therefore of great impact for her to find that her friend was not only not heartbroken, but had great peace and great faith in God. Seeing her, Edith wanted to know the source of this peace and this faith. While at the house of the widow Conrad, Edith has access to read the biography of who would become her inner life teacher and her Founding Mother, Saint Teresa of Jesus. Once she starts it, her Edith couldn’t put the book down, instead she spent the whole night reading until she finished it. Intellectual and logical as she was, she read and analyzed each page until finally her reasoning submitted to her grace, making her pronounce those words from her feminine heart: «this is the truth.»

 

The brilliant phenomenologist wants to surrender to grace, but she is going through deep crises. Crisis to which her will resists. Edith tirelessly studies «the phenomena» that are happening in her soul, she is passionate about «explaining» what happens without achieving it. This leads to her being chronically tired but she finally shows him what the power of God’s grace is in her soul.

 

She herself writes: «there is a state of calm in God, of total relaxation of all spiritual activity, in which no plans are made, no decisions of any kind are made and, above all, no action is taken, but all the The future is left to the will of God, one is totally abandoned to “destiny.” Edith has discovered the truth and surrenders: I will be Catholic.

 

A few months later, without further ado, her Edith enters a Catholic Church, and after Holy Mass, she looks for the priest in the sacristy and communicates her desire to be baptized. Faced with the amazement of the Father and questioning of her preparation to receive the sacrament and to be initiated into the Catholic Faith, Edith answers simply: ‘Take the test.’

 

On January 1, 1922, Edith is baptized Catholic. She adds Hedwig to her name, in honor of her friend who was her instrument in her conversion. Her baptism is a source of immense graces. She recognizes, admirably, that her insertion into the Mystical Body of Christ as a Catholic, far from robbing her of her identity as a Jew, rather gives her fulfillment and a deeper meaning. As she is Catholic, she feels more Jewish; she finds in Jesus Christ the meaning of all her faith and life as a Jewess. This double aspect creates in Edith an authentically reconciling heart between the two religions.

 

After her baptism, the assurance of her vocation to religious life emerged in her as a direct fruit. She herself wrote to her sister Rosa on one occasion: «One body, but many members. One Spirit, but many gifts. What is the place of each one? This is the vocational question. It cannot be answered only on the basis of of self-examination and an analysis of the possible paths. The solution must be asked in prayer and in many cases must be sought through obedience. «

 

It is difficult for a woman so accustomed to independent living and with her tenacious character to submit to obedience. But in effect, she did.

 

Apostolic Life

 

Edith wished to enter religious life almost immediately, but the Father who at that time advised her spiritually, recognizing the extraordinary gifts that she possessed, dissuades her, considering that she still had much good to do through her activities «in the world». Thus, Edith began a period of fruitful apostolate of impressive scope.

 

She began to work as a teacher at the Santa Magdalena Dominican School of Teacher Training. Here she establishes friendly relationships with various teachers and students, friendships that will last her entire life.

 

In addition to her classes, she writes, translates, and lectures. During these years she carried out, in addition to other minor works, two voluminous works: the translation into German of the letters and diaries of Cardinal Newman, and the translation, in two volumes, of the Questions on the truth of Saint Thomas Aquinas. This will become the fundamental basis for her philosophical works, later written in Carmel.

 

Also during this time, she gives various lectures and radio programs inside and outside Germany, being notably recognized by her colleagues.

 

Even in the midst of so much apostolic activity, she Edith herself seeks whenever she can, especially at Easter, the solitude and peace of the Benedictine Abbey of Beuron. Her love for the Liturgy of the Church leads her to spend hours in the chapel and to celebrate the different hours of prayer together with the Benedictines. When she must later choose a religious name, she decides to add the name of Benedicta, in recognition of the many graces she received from her during her hours with the Benedictine order.

 

 In 1933, the political situations in Germany were getting worse. On April 1, 1933, the new Nazi government ordered non-Aryan teachers to «spontaneously» abandon their professions.

 

Although she fears for the increasingly precarious situation for the Jews, Edith and her spiritual director recognize that, due to this eventuality, there is nothing that prevents her from entering Carmel, which has been her most constant dream for the last 11 years. . And so, at the most fruitful moment of her profession, Edith decides to listen to and access the voice of her heart, embracing religious life. The famous and brilliant Catholic speaker renounces the world and voluntarily becomes part of the long-desired anonymity.

 

Real madness!» How does anyone ever give up fame and success like that especially after so much struggle? She, who would have been named «Philosopher of the 20th century» if she had not retired … But Stein disappeared from public life and the Order of Carmel opened its doors to one of the great thinkers of our time.

 

His family

At this time, it would be appropriate to highlight what all this means for Edith’s family and especially for her mother. More than her profession, and more than her work in favor of women and her rights, it was the misunderstanding of her mother, which caused a true interior martyrdom for the saint. To her mother, Edith’s actions constituted a family betrayal that she would never accept. Her mother, who had never understood her conversion to Catholicism, suffers a severe blow with the new decision of her daughter more wanted to enter religious life, and refuses to listen to his explanations. Edith embraces this deep suffering that pierced her heart, for following the will of God, whatever the cost.

 

Entrance to the Cologne Convent

 

On April 15, 1934, she took the Carmelite habit and changed her name to Teresa Benedicta de la Cruz. There are many who translate her name as Teresa «blessed by the cross.» She has not taken her name lightly; She has understood well that embracing religious life has no other purpose than the generous giving of the soul on the cross, in union with the Crucified, for the good of souls.

 

She writes: “Look towards the Crucified. If you are united to him, as a bride in faithful fulfillment of your holy vows, it is your blood and his precious blood that is shed. United to him, you are like the omnipresent. With the strength of the Cross, he can be in all places of affliction. «

 

And she too: “There is a vocation to suffer with Christ and therefore to collaborate in his work of redemption. If we are united to the Lord, then we are members of the Mystical Body of Christ. All suffering carried in union with the Lord is suffering that bears fruit because it is part of the great work of redemption. «

On April 21, 1935, at the end of the novitiate year, he made his first religious profession and on April 21, 1938, his solemn profession.

 

It is during these years that he concluded one of the most admirable and profound of his works, not just to shine, but to obey. This is the great work entitled: Being Finite and Eternal. In this work, Edith deals with the most existential questions of man; she recognizes the infinite thirst that man possesses to know the truth and to experience the fruit of it, understood from the reality of the eternal and the transcendental. And so she seeks to unite the two sources that lead man to the knowledge of himself and the truth: faith and philosophy.

Once again, the situation of Jews and those who welcome or support them worsens. And in the face of growing hostility, especially after the famous night of the “Broken Crystals” (between November 9 and 10, 1938), Edith asked to move from Carmel in Cologne to avoid dangers to the community. She is transferred – along with her sister Rosa de ella, who, after her mother’s death, had converted to Catholicism like Edith and was a lay sister of the community – to the Carmelite Convent of Holland.

 

 It is here where Edith begins to write, in 1941, her last and most illustrious work: The Science of the Cross. Made out of obedience to her superiors, more than an intellectual work, it is the fruit of her own inner path of immolation and victimization of her in imitation of the Slain Lamb. Teresa Benedicta de la Cruz wished with all her being, to respond to the vocation of total surrender, even to the Cross.

 

She gives her own life in favor of sinners, and for the liberation of her people from the horrendous situation they live under the Nazis. Being behind the gates of Carmel has not silenced the voices of the suffering of her people, nor of the horror of war. Sister Teresa is deeply concerned about the situation of the Jewish people in general, and she sees in her sacrificial dedication an opportunity to respond. This growing desire to offer herself as her victim for her people, for the conversion of Germany and for peace in the world, becomes more and more alive. Her mode of apostolate had been transformed into the apostolate of of suffering.

 

he writes: “I was speaking (on one occasion) with the Savior and telling him that I knew that it was his Cross that had now been placed on the Jewish people. Most did not understand it; but those who knew it should willingly cast it upon themselves in the name of all. At the end of the retreat, he had the strongest persuasion that she had been heard by the Lord. But where the Cross was to take me was still unknown to me. «

 

The people suffered and Sister Teresa, out of love, wishes to suffer with them. «Love wants to be with the beloved.» Determined in her vocation to her Cross in favor of her people and sinners, Sister Teresa makes a written request to her Prioress, asking permission to offer herself as her victim

 

“Dear Mother, allow me Your Reverence, to offer myself as a holocaust to the Heart of Jesus to ask for true peace: that the power of the Antichrist disappears without the need for a new world war and that a new order may be established. I want to do it today because it is already midnight. I know I am nothing, but Jesus wants it, and He will call many more in these days. «

 

As a Catholic, Sister Teresa lives her Jewish reality to the full. She is called to respond as Queen Esther responded on behalf of her people. Her role is to intercede with the whole soul and with a total disposition to get what she asks for, even with the possible loss of life. But she does it in total union with the offering of the Divine Messiah. She wants to collaborate in what is lacking in the Passion of Christ.

 

She writes: “And that is why the Lord has taken my life for everyone. I have to continually think of Queen Esther that she was ripped from her people to intercede with the king for her people. I am a poor and helpless little Esther, but the king who has chosen me is infinitely great and merciful. This is a great comfort. «

In 1942 the deportations of Jews began. Lutherans, Calvinists and Catholics agree to read a joint protest text at their religious services on the same day. The Gestapo threatens all Christian authorities in the Netherlands with extending the deportation order to Jewish converts to their creeds. Calvinists and Lutherans backtrack, but Pius XII stands firm. The text of condemnation is read in all the Catholic churches of Holland. The revenge is fulfilled a few days later. The SS invaded the Carmel convent of Echt and took away two Jewish converts nuns: Edith and Rosa Stein.

 

It was not the first time that the Church protested and suffered. Already on Easter Day 1939, Pius XI’s encyclical harshly condemning Nazism had been read from every pulpit in Germany. Many committed priests and Catholics had suffered dire consequences.

This condemnation occurred before France and England decided against Hitler.

 

his time the Nazi Occupation forces, in retaliation for the declarations of the Catholic bishops of Holland against the deportations of the Jews, declare all Catholic-Jews «apart.» In view of the serious dangers they are facing in the Netherlands, the Carmel community begins the procedures so that Edith and Rosa can emigrate to Switzerland, but the attempts are unsuccessful. On August 2, 1942, members of the SS presented themselves at the convent and arrested Sister Teresa Benedicta de la Cruz and her sister Rosa de la Cruz to take them to the Auschwitz concentration camp. As they left the convent, Sister Teresa calmly took her sister by her hand and said: «Come, let’s do it for our people!» These words echoed ones that she had written long before but with the same dedication and determination:

 

“I only wish that death find me in a secluded place, far from all dealings with men, without brothers of habit to direct; without joys to console me, and tormented by all kinds of sorrows and pains. I have wanted God to test me as a servant, after He has proven in the work the tenacity of my character; I have wanted him to visit me in sickness, as he has tempted me in health and strength; I have wanted him to tempt me into disgrace, as he has done with the good name that I have had before my enemies. Deign, Lord, to crown your unworthy servant’s head with martyrdom. «

 

At the Top of the Cross

 

Upon being taken from the Convent of Holland, Sister Teresa and Rosa are first transferred to the Mersforrt concentration camp. They were pushed and shoved with the butt into dirty barracks. They had to sleep on iron box springs without a mattress; they had to go to the toilets in a group and watched over them while they were using them. The SS men amused themselves by placing the nuns against the wall and pointing their rifles at them without safety. In this horrible situation, a great peace emanated from Edith Stein.

On the night of August 4, they again forced the prisoners onto the means of transport, taking them to the north of the country. During this move, many died from suffocation and others went mad from despair. The caravan stopped in a vacant place, and among forests and meadows, they forced the 1200 people they were carrying to go towards the Westerbork countryside.

Throughout this horrendous trajectory, the prisoners were amazed at Edith’s serenity. Some of the survivors testify to the inner peace of the saint:

 

“The lamentations in the camp, and the nervousness in the newcomers, were indescribable. Edith Stein went from one place to another, among the women, comforting, helping, reassuring like an angel. Many mothers, on the verge of going mad, had not cared for their children for days. Edith immediately took care of the little ones, washed them, combed their hair and looked for food. «

Another says:

 

“There was a nun who immediately caught my attention and whom I have never been able to forget, despite the many disgusting episodes I witnessed there. She that woman, with a smile that was not a simple mask, illuminated and gave heat. I was certain that she was facing a truly great person. In a conversation she said: “The world is made of contradictions; Ultimately nothing will remain of these contradictions. Only great love will remain. How could it be otherwise?»

And finally another:

“I have the impression that she was thinking about the suffering that she anticipated, not about her own suffering – that’s why she was quite calm, too calm, I would say -, but about the suffering that she awaited for others. . When I want to mentally imagine her sitting in the barracks, all her external bearing awakens in me the idea of a Pieta without Christ.

fter several unspeakable torments and humiliations, on August 7, just after sunrise, Edith and her sister, along with about a thousand Jews, are transferred once more. Your destination is Auschwitz. They arrive at the concentration camp on August 9 and the prisoners are immediately taken to the gas chamber. It is there that Edith finds the culmination of her offering as the Bride of Christ. She dies as a martyr, offering herself as a holocaust for the salvation of souls, for the liberation of the people from her and for the conversion of Germany. With the Lord’s Prayer on her lips, Edith gives the fullest meaning to her life, giving herself for everyone, for love …

 

We can certainly declare that Teresa’s life was blessed by the Cross. With her life, Sister Teresa repeats the words of her great spiritual mother, St. Teresa of Avila: «I do not regret having given myself to Love.»

 

Edith Stein was canonized as a martyr in 1998 by Pope John Paul II, who gave her the title of «martyr of love.» In October 1999, she was declared co-patron of Europe.

 

Her last testament:

The telegram that Edith had sent to the Prioress of Echt before being taken to Auschwitz, contained this statement: «The science of the Cross can only be acquired by truly suffering the weight of the cross. From the first moment I have had the conviction intimate of it and I have said to myself from the bottom of my heart: Hail, OH Cruz, my only hope «.

1. Teresa Benedicta de la Cruz … Pray for us!

From the spiritual writings of Saint Teresa Benedicta de la Cruz

(Edith Stein Weke, II. Band, Verborgenes Leben ‘Hidden Life’ Freiburg-Basel-Wien 1987, S. 124-126)

 

Ave Crux, spes unica

 

«We greet you, Holy Cross, our only hope» We say so in the Church in the time of the Passion, a time dedicated to contemplation of the bitter sufferings of Our Lord Jesus Christ.