On Fire for God

St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, Religious (9 August) and

St. Lawrence, Deacon (10 August)

Both Martyrs

On August 10, 258, a deacon of Rome named Lawrence was set upon a grill and roasted to death in front of a cheering, screaming mob. His bishop, Pope St. Sixtus II, had been apprehended while celebrating Mass and executed on the spot just days before. Lawrence fully expected to follow his bishop, and perhaps even yearned to do so. As he submitted to the fire that consumed the last of his sinful nature, St. Lawrence is said to have joked with his executioners, "Turn me over, I'm done on this side." So it was that he passed from this life into the New Creation.

St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, a Carmelite sister, found martyrdom almost 1700 years later. Born Edith Stein and a Jew, she was reborn in Christ on the feast of Mary, the Mother of God, at the start of the year 1922. Later, her sister Rosa was also baptized. Her order transfered her to the Netherlands to avoid the growing Nazi threat. Her sister joined her there. After the Dutch bishops published a document condemning Nazi racism and the deportation of Jews, the Nazi occupying forces in the Netherlands revoked its exemption for converts from Judaism to Christianity. Her order was able to secure a visa to send Teresa Benedicta to Switzerland, but could not procure one for Rosa, who was only a guest of the house, and not a member of the order. St. Teresa Benedicta asked for, and received from her superiors, permission to stay in the Netherlands with her sister. They were thus deported together to Auschwitz, where on August 9, 1942, they were gassed and passed through the crematoria fires.

On the feasts of these great saints, tried by fire, it seems fitting to meditate on these verses from the Book of the Wisdom of Solomon:

"But the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God,and no torment will ever touch them. In the eyes of the foolish they seemed to have died,and their departure was thought to be an affliction, and their going from us to be their destruction;but they are at peace. For though in the sight of men they were punished,their hope is full of immortality. Having been disciplined a little, they will receive great good,because God tested them and found them worthy of himself; like gold in the furnace he tried them,and like a sacrificial burnt offering he accepted them. In the time of their visitation they will shine forth,and will run like sparks through the stubble. They will govern nations and rule over peoples,and the Lord will reign over them for ever. Those who trust in him will understand truth,and the faithful will abide with him in love, because grace and mercy are upon his elect,and he watches over his holy ones."

- Wisdom 3:1-9

St. Teresa Benedicta and St. Lawrence, burning with zeal for God's House,
pray for us.