# Maximilian Kolbe

Saint Maximilian Kolbe (8 January 1894 – 14 August 1941) was a Polish Conventual Franciscan friar who volunteered to die in place of a stranger in the German death camp of Auschwitz, located in German-occupied Poland during World War II. He had been active in promoting the veneration of the Immaculate Virgin Mary, founding and supervising the monastery of Niepokalanów near Warsaw, operating an amateur-radio station (SP3RN), and founding or running several other organizations and publications.
His feast day is 14 August, the day of his death.
Due to Kolbe's efforts to promote consecration and entrustment to Mary, he is known as the Apostle of Consecration to Mary. Kolbe composed the Immaculata prayer, a Traditional Catholic Marian prayer of consecration to the Immaculata, i.e. the immaculately conceived Virgin Mary.

## Let Yourself Be Led by the Immaculate

* He who loves will know the Immaculate much more than a philosopher or a theologian.
* He who wants to live the supernatural life clings to the Mother of Divine Grace. He who wants to convert and sanctify himself must have recourse to the Mother of God, for she is the Mediatrix of all graces. This mystery, that we receive everything through the Immaculate, is still little known. That is why we must propagate it; more, we must conquer the whole world to the Immaculate.

## Sourced Quotes

* “Modern times are dominated by Satan and will be more so in the future. The conflict with Hell cannot be engaged by men, even the most clever. The Immaculata alone has from God the promise of victory over Satan.”
* A person is great and becomes a witness and a teacher, capable of leaving an authentic message to the world, not so much on account of what one says or writes, but for what one is and what one achieves. What one says or writes deserves attention only insomuch as it is an expression of what one is or does.
* God has assigned each person a specific mission in this world: as He created the universe, He arranged primal causes so that the uninterrupted chain of their effects would engender the conditions and circumstances most favorable to carrying out that mission. Every man, therefore, is born with skills proportionate to the mission entrusted to him and, throughout the course of his life, environment, circumstances, and everything else contribute to make it possible and easy for him to achieve his aim. In fact, man’s perfection entirely consists in the attainment of that aim. The more accurately he manages to realize his task, the more scrupulously he fulfills its mission, the greater and holier he becomes in God’s eyes.
* "No one in the world can change Truth. What we can do and should do is to seek truth and to serve it when we have found it. The real conflict is the inner conflict. Beyond armies of occupation and the hetacombs of extermination camps, there are two irreconcilable enemies in the depth of every soul: good and evil, sin and love. And what use are the victories on the battlefield if we are ourselves are defeated in our innermost personal selves?"
* "Hate is not a creative force. Love is a creative force."
* "I want to be the greatest. But in what? In loving people and loving God!"
* "External activity is good; but, it is obviously of secondary importance and lesser still in comparison with the interior life, the life of recollection and of prayer, with the life of our personal love towards God"
* "I am not able to believe that man is a perfected ape. We are dealing here with the problem of evolutionism...This theory not only does not accord with the findings of contemporary experimental sciences, which are in continuous development, but they even contradict them, as has been accurately ascertained. The same Darwin, in the beginning, did not affirm that man descends from apes, but only presented a theory that man might descend from the apes, as a hypothesis."
* "There is much evil in the world, but let us remember that the Immaculata is more powerful and 'she shall crush the head of the serpent' [cf. Gn 3:15]."
* "Why do many today try to convince themselves and others that God does not exist, even though they know perfectly well that not even the effort exercised by all scientists put together can bring to life a miserable mosquito? To affirm everything originates by pure, unexplainable chance is utter absurdity; as if one could think that a simple clock has been assembled, simply by chance, without the help of someone!"

## References

* ↑ Czesław Lechicki, Kolbe Rajmund, Polski Słownik Biograficzny, Tom XIII, 1968, p. 297
* ↑ Kolbe, St. Maximilian. Let Yourself Be Led by the Immaculate . Angelus Press. Kindle Edition.
* ↑ Kolbe, St. Maximilian. Let Yourself Be Led by the Immaculate . Angelus Press. Kindle Edition.
* ↑ As quoted in Smith, Fr. Jeremiah J.. The Knight of the Immaculate: Father Maximilian Kolbe . Normanby Press. Kindle Edition.
* ↑ Maximilian Maria Kolbe. The Writings of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe - Volume I - Letters . Nerbini International. Kindle Edition.
* ↑ Maximilian Maria Kolbe. The Writings of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe - Volume II - Various Writings . Nerbini International. Kindle Edition.
* ↑ Saint Maximilian Kolbe - Knight of the Immaculate, The Society of the Holy Rosary.
* ↑ Saint Maximilian Kolbe - Knight of the Immaculate, The Society of the Holy Rosary.
* ↑ Saint Maximilian Kolbe - Knight of the Immaculate, The Society of the Holy Rosary.
* ↑ As quoted in "In Pursuit of Immortal Souls: Meditations on the Role of Redemptive Suffering, Silence and Prayer in the Missions" by Friar M.M. De Cruce, F.I., Franciscan Academy of the Immaculate, New Bedford, MA, 2002
* ↑ Maria Maximilian Kolbe. The Writings of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe - Volume II - Various Writings (pp. 769-770). Nerbini International. Kindle Edition.
* ↑ Maximilian Maria Kolbe. The Writings of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe - Volume I - Letters (Location 12061) Nerbini International. Kindle Edition
* ↑ Rycerz Niepokalanej, January 1929, pg. 5 as quoted in Maximilian Maria Kolbe, The Writings of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe - Volume I - Letters (Location 11391), Nerbini International, Kindle Edition (KW 1143)

## External links

* Saint Maximilian Kolbe, a popular biography at Catholicism.org
* St. Maximilian Kolbe Website
* Saint Maximilian Kolbe - Knight of the Immaculate
* National Shrine of St. Maximilian Kolbe - Libertyville, IL USA