BLESSED MARIA JULIA (nee Stanislawa) RODZINSKA, OP was born on 16 March 1899 in Nawojowa, Poland. She was one of five children of  Michał and Marianna (Sekuła).  Michal was an organist for the parish church, a talented composer and man-of-all-trades who took on various jobs to make ends meet. His wife Marianna helped where she could, but a long-term illness took her life when Stanislawa was only 8 years old. Times must have been tough for the whole family(two boys and two girl), as Michal battled rheumatism in his fight to provide for his children. Two years later, Michal died, leaving Stanislawa and her 3 siblings orphans.

At the age of ten the future blessed and her four year old sister became wards of the Dominican Sisters in Nawojowa.  The two boys were taken in by relatives.

 After finishing school there, she

 As a qualified teacher, she carried out her ministry in Mielżyn, Rawa Ruska and Vilnius (now Lithuania) for 22 years.

After the outbreak of World War II, she secretly taught Polish language, history and religion, and conducted humanitarian activities.

She also assisted the archbishop in saving Jews from capture by the Gestapo and provided for retired priests who otherwise would have been left impoverished.

 Due to the inhumane conditions of concentration camps, prisoners often lost their sense of morality for the sake of their own survival.  However, Sr. Julia jeopardized her own life to show mercy to her fellow prisoners in the dark and tormenting cruelty of Stutthof. 

 Sister Julia died of exhaustion and disease on 20 February 1945 in Stutthof, two months before the concentration camp was liberated by the Red Army. Her naked body was discarded on a pile of corpses, but someone honored her by placing a little cloth over her body. The words of those who survived Bl. Julia perhaps tell it best: “Not only Catholic compatriots mourned her death, but also Russians, Latvians, and others.” The Jewish women did not hesitate to call Sr. Julia a martyr and a saint. “She gave her life for others, died sacrificing herself; she was the Angel of goodness.”

In doing research in our previous blog about Bl. Nikolaus Gross, I discovered SERVANT OF GOD EUGEN BOLZ.  Interestingly enough he was the uncle of one of our dear friends in the Vatican, Cardinal Augustin Mayer, OSB (Abbey at Metten) and his sister, who once stayed at our Abbey in CT.

Born in Rottenburg am Neckar in1881 of a Catholic family, Eugen was his parents' twelfth child.  His father Joseph Bolz was a salesman, his mother was Maria Theresia Bolz (née Huber). He joined the Windhorstbund, the youth organization of the Center Party, at an early age.

He studied law in Tubingon and i

Later he also volunteered to work with Carl Goerdeler and was to be given the office of a minister following the coup attempt of July 20, 1944. Eugen Bolz was arrested on August 12, 1944. He was sentenced to death by the People's Court on December 21, 1944, (Photo to right) and murdered in Berlin-Plötzensee on January 23, 1945.

 One wonders if he knew Bl. Nikalaus Gross and how many other "holy" people in prison?

*(Another connection- When the mother one of our nuns at Regina Laudis died I went with her to her family home in Vermont. Her father annd I got along very well and before I left to return to the Abbey, he told me I could have anything in the house I wanted.  I chose a very small metal placque on the wall, not knowing the value to the family.  It was given to them by ex-Chancellor Bruning  when he stayed with them after fleeing Nazi Germany. I hade the medal for years turning it over to a younger nun when I came west to OLR.)

BLESSED STEFAN GRELEWSKIborn in 1899 in Dwikozy, Swietokrzyskie, Poland was the older brother of Blessed Kazimierz Grelewski. He studied at the Progimnazjum in Sandomierz and Lubartów in Poland.

He was prefect of a boy‘s elementary school from 1928 through 1931 and  of the Jan Kochanowski state boy‘s grammar school from 1932 until the outbreak of World War II in 1939.

He w

He died of starvation on 9 May 1941 in the camp hospital of Dachau. He was beatified with his brother in the group of 108 martyrs of World War II in 1999.

BLESSED KAZIMIERZ GRELEWSKIwas the younger brother of Bl. Stefan. He was born 1907 in Dwikozy near Sandomierz. His parents were Michał and Eufrozyna née Jarzyna.

He graduated from primary school in the Wysokie Mountains and received his secondary school certificate after graduating from high school in Sandomierz. In 1923 he entered the Sandomierz Theological Seminary, and in August 1929 he was ordained a priest by Bishop Paweł Kubicki.

In January 1941, he was arrested by the Gestapo along with his brother, Father  Stefan. He was taken to the prison on Kościuszki Street, where he was tortured,  transported to the prison in Skarżysko-Kamienna, and then by rail to the concentration camp in Oświęcim, where he received the number 10443.

In April 1941, he was transported to the Dachau camp (no. 25280), where he lost his brother. He then wrote to the family that Stefan died in his arms.

Witnesses of his anguish reported that one day in the Dachau camp "a kapo struck him and knocked him down to earth." Father Kazimierz rose, made a sign of the cross from the attacker and said: "God forgive you." After these words, the kapo attacked him, again  and shouted: "I will send you to your God in a moment." He  died on January 9, 1942 by hanging on the camp gallows, and at the last moment he called to the executioners: "Love God!

Due to the war in Ukraine, almost 10 million Ukrainians have been displaced from their homes. Almost 4 million have become internally displaced persons (IDPs), and another six million persons have taken refuge in another country, with Poland and Germany taking the lion’s share of those refugees.

Men between 18-60 had to remain in the country for possible deployment in the military, which means most of the refugees have been women, children and elderly. 

Ukrainian Father Oleksandr Zelinskyi of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate and director of EWTN Ukraine since 2017, says that“hope is something that helps us carry on, to work, to live, believing that God can change even the worst for the good. And there are many people bearing witness that faith and trust in God helps them in these difficult times.”

Father Zelinskyi said the people are very grateful to all those in the world who continue to pray for Ukraine. He feels that the act of consecration of Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary carried out by Pope Francis in March 2022, “did some good, because after this consecration the Russians had to leave the Kiev region. And I believe it was possible thanks to the providence of God.”

We know from local friends that the Knights of Columbas are still supplying goods  to families in need through their Charity Convoy.  Over a million pounds of food has been delivered to Ukrainian families through this charitable mission. In Solidarity with Ukraine, an inspiring new film from the Knights of Columbus, gives a vivid example of what it means to be a Christian disciple in the midst of war, and how the light of the Gospel continues to shine in the darkness.

While we are unable to physically be present to the people of this war-torn country, who continue to amaze us by their strength and courage, we can pray, and daily we do!

Unlike our previous saints for Lent, ST. TITUS BRANDSMA was not Polish. He was born Anno Sjoerd Brandsma to Titus Brandsma and his wife Tjitsje Postma at Oegeklooster, near Hartwerd, in the Province of Friesland in 1881. His parents, who ran a small dairy farm, were devout and committed Catholics, a minority in a predominantly Calvinist region. With the exception of one daughter, all of their children (three daughters and two sons) entered religious orders.

In the years following his 1905 ordination, he received a doctorate in philosophy and initiated a project to translate the works of St Teresa of Avila into Dutch. One of the founders of the Catholic University of Nijmegen, he served as a professor of philosophy and the history of mysticism at the school. While there he was known more for his availability to faculty and students than for his academic achievements. He later served as rector magnificus (1932–33).

During his brief time at Dachau Father Brandsma was well-known for his kindness and spiritual support of other prisoners. His death on July 26, 1942 was a result of the Reich’s program of medical experimentation on prisoners. He gave a wooden rosary to the nurse who administered the fatal injection. She later became Catholic and testified to his holiness. In recent years St. Titus has been honored by both the cities of Nijmegen and Dachau. He was beatified in 1985, and canonized in 2022.

In 2005, St. Titus was chosen by the inhabitants of Nijmegen as the greatest citizen to have lived there. A memorial church dedicated to him now stands in the city.

 The saint’s studies on mysticism was the basis for the establishment in 1968 of the Titus Brandsma Institute in Nijmegen, dedicated to the study of spirituality. It is a collaboration between the Dutch Carmelite friars and Radboud University Nijmegen.

His ideas were very much those of his own age and modern as well. He offset contemporary Catholicism's negative theological opinion about Judaism with a strong disaffection for any kind of antisemitism in Hitler's Germany.

 BLESSED HILARY  JANUSZEWSKIwas born in1907 in Krajenki, Poland and was given the name of Pawel. He received a Christian education from his parents, Martin and Marianne. He attended the college in Greblin (where his family lived from 1915), continuing his studies at the Institute of Suchary, but had to abandon these due to his family’s economic difficulties. He took up other studies and in 1927 entered the Order of Carmel.

Hilary was ordained priest on 15 July 1934. He obtained his lectorate in theology and the prize for the best students of the Roman Academy of St Thomas and in 1935 returned to Poland to the monastery in Kracow. On his return to Poland, he was appointed professor of Dogmatic Theology and Church History at the Institute of the Polish Province in Cracow.

 In 1939, he was appointed prior of the community, with Poland recently occupied by the Germans. One year later, these invaders decreed the arrest of many religious and priests.

 On 18 September 1940 the Gestapo deported four friars from the Carmel in Kracow. In December, when other friars were arrested, Father Hilary decided to present himself in exchange for an older and sick friar. He was sent to the prison of Montelupi (Kracow), then to the concentration camp of Sachsenchausen and in April 1941 to the concentration camp of Dachau.

Together with the other Carmelites, among whom was Blessed Titus Brandsma (previous Blog), he, encouraged others, praying and giving hope for a better tomorrow. When there was an outbreak of typhus in another barrack, 32 priests presented themselves to the authorities to help the sick. Father Hilary joined this group.

 He was heard to say “You know I will not come back from there, but they need us.” His apostolate lasted 21 days because, infected by typhus, he died on 25 March 1945, a few days before the liberation of the concentration camp. His body was cremated in the crematorium of Dachau.

Father Hilary Januszewski was beatified by Pope Saint John Paul II on 13 June 1999, during his apostolic visit to Warsaw (Poland) as part of the 108 Polish martyrs of the Second World War, victims of Nazi persecution.

In the mid 8os a neighbor of our Abbey in CT gave us each a photo of a newly martyred priest. She and her husband were Polish- he had been a general in the Polish army in WWII. The photo  was of a new “monument” erected on the spot where this young priest had been martyred.  The Communists wrongly thought that if they got rid of him, his words against them would fade away. The authorities were badly mistaken, as the death caused so much uprising it was the beginning of the end for Communism in this very Catholic country.  While the whole affair was disturbing at the time for us in the USA, it was too remote for me at the time to stir much in my heart.  Yet I still have that photo, some 40 years later.  (see “monument”  below).

BLESSED JERZY POPIELUSZKO was born in 1947, on a farm in the small village of Okopy located in North Eastern Poland. His parents Wladyslaw and Mariana were devout Catholics. Jerzy was a fragile child but he made up for any physical infirmities in strength of character.

Each morning before classes began Jerzy would walk three miles to serve Mass, and then after classes were over in the evening, would return to the Church to pray the Rosary. His spirituality was ridiculed and he was accused by his teacher of praying too much. (I remember when I was in the Czech Republic in the late 1980s, the friend I stayed with said they too suffered because of their faith, especially regarding employment.)

As a precaution Jerzy kept secret his intention to become a priest for fear that if it were known,  the results of his exams would be altered. After graduating high school in 1965 he headed for the seminary in Warsaw, chosen due to its closeness to the monastery of St Maximilian Kolbe, a favorite saint of his.

After one year of seminary training Jerzy was drafted into the military for a two year tour in a special unit for clerics in Bartoszyce.  The plan for drafting clerics into the service was to indoctrinate them with the communistic ideal and cause them to lose their vocation. In spite of bitter persecution ensuing from the practice of his Faith, Jerzy firmly defied the authority’s attempt to marginalize Catholicism.

On one occasion, when Jerzy refused to crush his rosary beneath his heel he was cruelly beaten and placed in solitary confinement for a month. Another time he refused to remove a medal from abound his neck, so was forced to stand for hours in the freezing rain. He was also made to crawl around the camp on his hands and knees as a punishment for saying the rosary.

This contributed to his already frail health, causing him to undergo a life threatening surgery to undo the damage done to his heart and kidneys from his beatings. The recovery caused his ordination to be delayed, but on May 28, 1972, he was ordained by Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski, the Primate of Poland who led the Church’s resistance to communism, beatified September 12, 2021.

After being ordained, he served at local parishes.  His sermons, famous for exhorting members of the faithful to resist Communism, were broadcast on Radio Free Europe. 

From December 13, 1981, to July 22, 1983, the Polish People's Republic imposed martial law in an effort to crush political opposition.  During that period, Father Jerzy continued to celebrate Mass in public places. 

The government grew more and more frustrated with Father Jerzy as more and more people flocked to him, and at the monthly Mass for the homeland, had guards stationed at every block corner to watch him. He went out of his way to be kind to these guards, calling them his “Guardian Angels” and even bringing them coffee in the cold Polish winter.

In 1983, he was arrested on trumped-up charges, but members of the clergy intervened and he was soon released and granted amnesty.  He then emerged unscathed from a car "accident" on October 13, 1984, that had been staged by the state for the purpose of killing him. 

But on October 19, 1984, he was murdered by three agents of the Security Service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.  The thugs lured him by faking the breakdown of their vehicle and flagging him down for help.  They savagely beat him, tied him up, and shoved him in the trunk of their car.  They then bound a stone to his feet and dumped him into a nearby reservoir.  His body was recovered on October 30. 

"Truth, like justice," he once observed, "is connected to love, and love has a price." 

An uproar went up across Poland.  His funeral was attended by 250,000.  His martyrdom became a flash point for the anti-Communist resistance movement.  His assassins were subsequently tried and convicted of murder, as was the colonel who gave the order. 

He was buried in Saint Stanislaus Kostka Church, Warsaw, and in 2009 was posthumously awarded the Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest civilian and military honor.

The rock used to kill him is now housed as a relic in San Bartolomeo all'Isola, the Shrine to the New Martyrs of the 20th and 21st centuries, in Rome.

He was beatified on June 6, 2010, by Archbishop Angelo Amato on behalf of Pope Benedict XVI. His feast is October 19.

Among the Polish 108 martyrs of WWII was a Polish prince. BLESSED JAN FRANCISZEK CZARTORYSK,was born in 1897 in in Pelkinie, near the town of Jarosław, southeastern Poland, into the noble Polish family of the Czartoryskis. After completing his secondary education, Jan took up studies at the the Lwów Polytechnic (today's Ukraine), one of the most prestigious centers of technical studies in prewar Poland and also in Central Europe. He graduated with a master's degree in engineering and architecture.

During the Bolshevik aggression against Poland in 1920, Jan along with many young volunteers took an active part in the heroic defence of the city of Lwów against the Red Army. His valiance and bravery earned him the Cross of Valour, a Polish military decoration awarded to those who distinguished themselves for deeds of valor and bravery on the battlefield.

In 1921 after the defeat of the Bolsheviks, Jan became one of the founders of the Catholic Youth Association called "Rebirth". But it was not politics that was to become his true calling. In 1926 he entered the higher clerical seminary in Lwów with a view to becoming a priest. Soon afterwards, however, he discovered a strong call to the consecrated life and joined the Dominican Order.

 Poland was hit by World War II, the cataclysm of apocalyptic proportions for the nation. On the 1st August 1944 Father Michal was fulfilling his ministry in Warsaw. He was on his way to an appointment with an eye doctor when the Warsaw Uprising against the German occupation began.

Together with the injured insurgents, Father Michal was shot by the Germans on 6th September at about 2 pm. Their bodies were thrown on a barricade, saturated with petrol oil and set alight.

Father Michal Czartoryski was beatified by Pope John Paul II on 13th June 1999 alongside 107 other World War II martyrs. He is the Patron Saint of the town of Jarosław. Feast Day is September 6.

BLESSED JOZEF CEBULA was born into a modest family in 1902, at Malnia in southern Poland. He suffered tuberculosis as a youth. After an unexpected recovery, he visited an Oblate shrine where he shared his story with an Oblate priest. The priest advised Józef to study with the Oblates at the newly-established Oblate minor seminary.

At the age of 19 he entered the Congregation of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate. Following ordination to the Oblate priesthood in 1927, Father Józef spent the next ten years teaching Oblate seminarians. From 1931 on, he was the director of the minor seminary in Lubliniec. In 1937, he became novice master at Markowice where his humility and gentleness were noteworthy. During this time he was also active in the preaching ministry and was much sought after as a confessor.

Known for his humility, Bl. Józef was a man of quiet prayer with a deep spiritual life. He radiated peace in the very middle of the death camp, even when tormented by the Nazis. In Mauthausen he was harassed and forced to work hard, to break rocks in the quarry, simply because he was a Roman Catholic priest. He was forced to carry 60-pound rocks from the quarry to a camp two miles away. He had to climb the 186 "Death Stairs" while being beaten and insulted by his tormentors. *

He was declared blessed by Pope John Paul II along with the other 107 martyrs of WWII. While there were so many in this group, and each story different, all gave their lives in the name of Jesus Christ.

*The Stairs of Death at Mauthausen concentration camp

Several times throughout the day, prisoners were forced to carry blocks of stone, often weighing as much as 60 pounds, up the 186 stairs of the so called "Stairs of Death". Often, exhausted prisoners would collapse and drop their load on top of those following, creating a horrific domino effect with prisoners falling onto the next, all the way down the stairs. The heavy stones would crush their limbs and bodies. People died on these stairs every day.

Today, the "Stairs of Death" form part of the guided tours at the Mauthausen Memorial. The stairs have been redone and straightened so that tourists can easily climb up and down them, but at that time they were tilted and slippery.

Many Catholic priests and seminarians were imprisoned in the Nazi prison camps, and many died of the intentionally harsh treatment they received. One of these was BLESSED KARL LEISNER, born in 1915 in Rees on the Lower Rhine. As a youth he was active in the Christian youth movement. After he finished his education, Bishop August Graf von Galen (beatified by Pope Benedict XVI in 2005) assigned him responsibility for the care of young Catholics in the diocese of Münster.

In 1934, he entered the seminary in Munich. An apostolic young seminarian, he tried to organize the Catholic students into groups for discussion and recreation. He would take teenagers on "camping" hikes to Belgium and Holland so that they could talk freely about the contrast between what Hitler was teaching and what the Church teaches. However, when the Nazis began to demand complete control over all German youth, Karl's efforts became less effectual.

The government  made Bl. Karl serve for six months in agricultural work service. Despite the Nazi ban on religious activities among his fellow farmers, he arranged ways for them to attend Sunday Mass. On discovering this, the Gestapo declared him a dangerous person. Searching his home, they made off with all his diaries and papers, and most of his books. Fortunately, they preserved all these documents, thus preserving data for a history of this young man's heroic life.

Shortly after his ordination, during a medical examination, the doctor told the new deacon that he had contracted tuberculosis. In those days, the sole treatment available for the disease was good food and fresh air. These were to be found at a sanatorium in St. Blasien in the Black Forest, where he was sent and began to recover. It was during his recovery that a fellow patient heard him criticize Hitler. That very day, the Gestapo arrested him as a political prisoner.  

Having then recovered partially, he was put into jail. Then he was sent to the concentration camp at Sachsenhausen, and later transferred to Dachau. His tuberculosis worsening, he was lodged in the infamous Dachau infirmary, where the patients were often selected for medical experiments. Only the help of fellow prisoners prevented Karl from being included in the “invalids’ transport” to Hartheim extermination clinic.

In mid-December 1944, Karl fulfilled his long-held desire when he was secretly ordained as a priest by the Bishop of Clermont-Ferrand, Gabriel Piguet, who was also a prisoner in Dachau concentration camp, himself having been arrested for aiding Jewish children. (He was later declared Righteous Among the Nations for his charity). The ordination, carefully prepared by Catholic and Protestant clergymen, was a moving event.

The new priest was so ill afterwards, that he had to postpone his first Mass for a week. After that first Mass he never got to celebrate another. When the Allies liberated Dachau in April 1945, he was sent to a sanitarium, but he died a few weeks later of the rigors of disease and jail.

Statue: Kleve, N. Rhine-Westphalia, Germany

BL. STEFAN WINCENTY FRELICHOWSKIwas born in 1913 in Chełmża Poland, the third of seven children to the baker Ludwik Frelichowski and Marta Olszewska. 

In 1923 he began his high school studies at Pelpin where in 1927 he was admitted into the Sodality of the Blessed Virgin. He joined the scouts the same year, later serving as the troop leader. After he graduated from high school he began studies to become a priest, remaining active in the scouts.

 In Toruń he was responsible for the parish press and vicar of the Assumption parish church. In 1938 he became the leader of the Old Scouts and the chaplain of the scout district of Pomerania. He was known for his devotion to the Sacred Heart.   

On 18 October 1939 and he was imprisoned in the Fort VII camp on a temporary basis before being sent on 8 January 1940 with around 200 prisoners to another camp. On 10 January 1940 he was sent to the concentration camp at Stutthof and then later on 6 April to Grenzdorf and Sachsenhausen before being sent to Dachau as his final destination on 13 December 1940.

Bl. Stefan contracted typhus while tending to prisoners who had the disease and he also contracted pneumonia. He died on 23 February 1945 and his remains were lined in a white sheet decorated with flowers before he was cremated. But before that the prisoner Stanisław Bieniek made a death mask and a cast of the late priest's right hand.

He was beatified in 1999 in Torun, Poland by Pope St. John Paul.  His feast is February 23. He is the patron of Polish scouts.

BL. KAROL HERMAN STEPIENwas born in 1910 in Lódz, Poland to Józef and Marianna Puch, poor working class farmers. Karol as a child was considered extremely intelligent but an unruly child.

He early felt a call to the priesthood, and at age 13 began studying at the Franciscan seminary in Lviv (in modern Ukraine). He joined the Franciscan Friars Minor Conventual in 1928 at Lodz-Lagiewniki, taking the name Herman and making his solemn profession in 1932.

His superiors did not see a monastic future for him. He was having educational problems and was advised to leave the order. However, Karol was stubborn and persevered.

Brother Herman continued his studies at the Pontifical University of Saint Bonaventure in Rome, Italy, and was ordained a priest in Rome in 1936. Father Herman continued his studies at the Jan Kazimierz University in Lvov, earning a Master's degree in Theology. He served as priest in Franciscan Shrine of Our Lady of Sorrows in Radomsko, Poland, then the church and Franciscan monastery of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Vilnius, Lithuania.

When the Nazis invaded in 1943, Stepien decided to stay with his people. He declared: "Pastors cannot leave the believers!".

On July 19, 1943, the Nazis took Fathers Stępień, Puchala and their parishioners to a barn in Borowikowszczyzna (Belarus). Both priests were shot in the head. The barn was then set on fire.

The remains were later retrieved by local Catholics and buried in the parish church in Pierszaje, Poland.

He was beatified June 13 1999 by Pope ST. Johnn Paul II with the other 107 martyrs of WWII.

His feast is July 18.

After Jesus had washed their feet, He put his outer garment back on and returned to the table. “Do you understand what I have just done to you?” He asked. “I, your Lord and Teacher, have just washed your feet. You, then, should wash one another’s feet. I have set an example for you, so that you will do just what I have done for you.”

GEZA GYORKE artist was born in 1991 in Uzhhorod, Ukraine. At the age of five he entered the Uzhhorod Children's Art School. His teacher was a famous artist Emma Levadska. He also studied at A. Hromovy's studio. In 1997, for the first time he took part in the fine arts competition in memory of Zoltan Bakonyi and became one of three winners. Later he was a multiple winner of the national and international children competitions and festivals. Since 2001, he has been a member of the children and youth art association ‘Minor Louvre’.

EASTER BLESSINGS

DAWN  LOOKING EAST ACROSS MONASTERY PASTURES

PHOTO BY OUR NEIGHBOR NED GRIFFIN

A Take up thine eyes, which feed on earth;

wake sad heart, whom sorrow ever drowns;

Unfold thy forehead gather’d into frowns:
Thy Savior comes, and with him mirth:
Awake, awake;

And with a thankful heart his comforts take.
But thou dost still lament, and pine, and cry;
And feel his death, but not his victory.

Arise sad heart; if thou dost not withstand,
Christ’s resurrection thine may be:
Do not by hanging down break from the hand
Which as it riseth, raiseth thee:
Arise, arise;

And with his burial-linen dry thine eyes.
Christ left his grave-clothes, that we might, when grief
Draws tears, or blood, not want a handkerchief.

                        George Herbert (d. 1633) English

“While it was still dark Mary Magdalene had come to watch at the tomb, and she found Jesus whom she sought standing there in the flesh. But you must know Him now according to the spirit, not according to the flesh, and you can be sure of finding His spiritual presence if you seek Him with a desire like hers, and if He observes your persevering prayer. Say then to the Lord Jesus, with Mary’s love and longing: ‘My soul yearns for You in the night; my spirit within me earnestly seeks for You.'”

                       From an Easter sermon by Bl. Guerric of Igny

After the crucifixion, Mary Magdalene meets Jesus outside the tomb in the garden and mistakes Him for the gardener. How one asks can she mistake Him for another?  She who knew Him so well?  Anyone who has known real grief, can understand this.  Was she weeping so violently, that her tears blinded her? Was she in such a state that her mind was not functioning normally?  It is only when she hears His voice that she then recognizes Him.

Art: Michael Cook- British

EX- ABBOT PRIMATE NOTKER WOLF died unexpectedly at the age of 83 3 April 2024 while traveling from Rome to his Abbey. He was a German Benedictine monk, priest, abbot, musician, and author. He was a member of St. Ottilien Archabbey located in Bavaria, Germany, which is part of the Benedictine Congregation of Saint Ottilien. He previously was elected and served as the ninth Abbot Primate of the Benedictine Confederation of the Order of Saint Benedict. He was elected to his position as Abbot Primate in 2000 and ended his final term in 2016.

Abbot Notker Wolf was a practicing musician who recorded and played shows with his band Feedback. His band was often referred to as a Christian rock band, and he played guitar wearing a pectoral cross.  He loved the chant and also played the flute. His passions included inter-religious dialogue, environmental issues, responsible immigration policies, and ethical leadership and management. He never retired but continued to write and travel, giving lectures.  He was known for his happy disposition.

An American monk, Father Gregory Polan Abbot of Conception Abbey in Missouri succeded him as Abbot Primate.

                                            Kateryna Shadrina- Ukraine

If you were not risen,
Lord Christ, to whom would we go
to discover a radiance
of the face of God?

If you were not risen,
we would not be together seeking your communion.
We would not find in your presence forgiveness,
wellspring of a new beginning.

If you were not risen,
where would we draw the energy for following you
right to the end of our existence,
for choosing you again and anew?

                  Brother Roger of Taize

Jesus to St. Faustina  (1931)

On that day all the divine floodgates through which graces flow are opened. Let no soul fear to draw near to Me, even though its sins be as scarlet. My mercy is so great that no mind, be it of man or of angel, will be able to fathom it throughout all eternity. Everything that exists has come forth from the very depths of My most tender mercy. Every soul in its relation to Me will contemplate My love and mercy throughout eternity. The Feast of Mercy emerged from My very depths of tenderness. It is My desire that it be solemnly celebrated on the first Sunday after Easter. Mankind will not have peace until it turns to the Fount of My Mercy. (Diary of Divine Mercy #699)

With our world in such a sorry state, we all wonder where we are headed. And true to form, we hear more about the negative in our daily news, than the good that is spreading.  But in our seemingly dark world, the Light of Christ is shining.

One example of people’s thirst for this Light in their lives is the program The Chosen, which has had more viewers than any crowdfunded project. By the end of 2022, 108 million people worldwide had watched at least part of one episode.

 Father Mike Schmitz’s podcast The Bible in a Year has had over 500 million downloads. (While this podcast is meant for all ages, I highly recommend it to teens having a difficult time). Bishop Robert Barron’s book on the Eucharistic revival, This Is My Body, has sold more copies than every celebrity memoir last year. And it is not only Catholics who are being touched.

 So rather than seeing the world through dark lenses this Eastertide, see the Light that is coming through, giving us hope!

During Lent we presented many new martyrs of WWII. A special memorial chapel was created by St. John Paul II.  In 1999, in preparation for the Great Jubilee of the year 2000, St. John Paul II established a “Commission of NEW MARTYRS” to investigate Christian martyrdom in the 20th century. The commission worked for two years on the premises of St. Bartholomew’s Basilica, collecting some 12,000 files from all over the world..

More than thirteen thousand testimonies were received by the commission, some of which were recalled on the occasion of the ecumenical prayer in memory of the witnesses to the faith of the 20th century, presided over by St. John Paul II at the Colosseum on May 7, 2000.

On that occasion John Paul II said:

“The generation to which I belong has known the horror of war, concentration camps, persecution. […] The experience of the Second World War and the years that followed led me to consider with grateful attention the shining example of those who, from the early years of the twentieth century until its end, experienced persecution, violence, death, because of their faith and their behavior inspired by the truth of Christ. And they are many! Their memory should not be lost, rather it should be recovered in a documented manner.”

St. John Paul II decided that the Basilica of St. Bartholomew on Tiber Island should become a memorial place for the “new witnesses of the faith” of the 20th century. The proclamation was solemnly celebrated on October 12, 2002, in the presence of Cardinals Ruini (Rome), Kasper (Germany) and George (Chicago), and the Orthodox Patriarch of Romania Teoctist. A large icon dedicated to the Witnesses of the Faith of the 20th century was placed on the high altar.

In 2008 Pope Benedict XVI visited the Basilica and explained:

“Remember the Christians who fell under the totalitarian violence of Communism, Nazism, those killed in America, in Asia and Oceania, in Spain and Mexico, in Africa: we ideally retrace many painful events of the past century. So many fell while fulfilling the Church’s evangelizing mission: their blood mingled with that of native Christians to whom the faith had been communicated.”

 Martyrs gather around the figures of Christ surrounded by Mary, John the Evangelist and John the Baptist as well as Apostles Peter, Paul and Andrew.

To the right and left are seen as two great processions of witnesses to the faith: one symbolizes the Christian East, the other the West. In these two large processions one recognizes people like Dietrich Bonhöffer, Patriarch Tikhon of the Russian Orthodox Church, Father Girotti (Italian Dominican, biblical scholar, who died in the Dachau concentration camp where he preached for a long time).

Continuing downwards, one notices some destroyed buildings and Christians about to be killed; it is a reminder of the genocide of the Armenians and many eastern Christians in Turkey in 1915, a rupture of more than a thousand years of cohabitation in that land.

Also recalled are all the attempts at the actual annihilation of the Christian presence, such as the one that took place in Albania: a priest with a child in his hand is seen being killed (this is the memory of Father Kurti, sentenced to death in 1972 only because he had secretly baptized a child in the camp where he was held).

On the way up one encounters a man dressed in gaudy clothes being beaten by two guards: this is the public humiliation that was reserved for so many Christians before they were killed, as a way of striking at their dignity, discrediting them in the eyes of the people. Above, the frame shows a crowd about to be shot, in a public execution, as happened at numerous turns in 20th century history. The first picture below, on the other hand, remembers the many murdered, those whose lives were suddenly cut short.  One sees a bishop on the altar, it is Bishop Romero, killed while celebrating the Eucharist. One recognizes, among others, Msgr Gerardi, Don Giuseppe Puglisi, killed by the mafia in Sicily.

On the left instead, the panels remind us how, in suffering, the life of the ‘new martyrs’ is a testimony of love, stronger than hatred: to evil they have responded with good. The first scene offers a vision of the Soviet Gulag on the Solovki islands: it is a very old monastery, transformed by the regime into a detention camp, which gathered mainly Christians. It shows two bishops, one young and one old, pushing a wheelbarrow: it is the representation of a testimony given by a survivor who in her diary recounted of two bishops, one old and Orthodox, the other young and Catholic, who went to the extremely hard forced labor together, so that the young man could help the old man. It is a sign of Christians learning to love and help each other again in the suffering of persecution.

In the upper painting, from inside a prison, in Romania, one can identify the prisoners, each holding sheets of paper in their hands: these are parts of a single Bible (possession of which was forbidden by prison regulations), which the inmates had divided among themselves so that they could learn part of it by heart and recite it to the others, and thus not lose the precious treasure of the Word of God. 

Moving up the iconic narrative, one encounters persecuted Christians who nevertheless never ceased to feed the hungry, heal the sick, love their suffering neighbors, and communicate the Gospel to all. One sees a Christian welcoming a man dressed in the uniform that, in this icon, identifies the persecutors: it is the sign of the readiness of the witnesses of faith to forgive, to trust in the possibility for every man to change his own heart.

It is amazing how much is conveyed in this stricking icon, with the martyrs and others..

 In April 2017 Pope Francis visited the Bascilica along with relatives and friends of some of the new martyrs:Karl Schneider, son of a pastor killed in a Nazi camp in 1939; Roselyne Hamel, sister of the Hamel murdered in France last year; Francisco Hernandez Guevara, a friend of William Quijano killed in 2009 in Central America for trying to offer an alternative to youth away from gangs.

Mother Felicitas’ son (a tenured professor at Dartmouth and expert on Russian politics) was just here, and as usual gives us an update on the on-going crises in the Ukraine. This reminded me that in the British music magazine we receive from a neighbor (See Blog February 23), I found another Ukrainian musician in this last month’s issue. In looking him up I found an article from The Flute View from April 1, 2022.

DENIS SAVELYEVis flute player from Lviv. He was the first-prize winner of the 2017 NYFC Competition, “Rising Star'' at the 2021 Galway Flute Festival, and Young Artist of 2019 NFA. Denis began studying flute at the young age of five. After completing a combined Bachelor’s and Master’s degree at the ‘Gnessin Academy of Music in Moscow, he moved to the USA to pursue a MM and Professional Studies at the Mannes School of Music, The New School University, where he studied under Judith Mendenhall. He was later a member of The Orchestra Now, graduating from Bard College with a Master’s degree in Curatorial, Critical, and Performance Studies. Currently, Denis is pursuing a Doctor of Musical Arts Degree at the Peabody Conservatory of the Johns Hopkins University in the studio of Marina Piccinini.

 Denis has won multiple prizes, including the 1st Prize at the New York Flute Club Competition, the New Jersey Flute Society, and the 2nd Prize at the Young Artist Competition of the National Flute Association. 

Orchestrally, he has worked with the Mariinsky Theater in Vladivostok, as well as with Orchestra Now, the Manhattan Symphonie, and the New York Symphonic Ensemble on its Japanese tour in 2016

He has performed at various international venues, including the Kennedy Center in Washington DC; Merkin Concert Hall, the Morgan Library, and the Metropolitan Museum in NYC; Lviv Philharmonic, Berlin Konzerthaus; Suntory Hall in Tokyo, as well as Weill Hall at Carnegie Hall, under conductors such as Neeme Järvi, Fabio Luisi, Hans Graf, Gerard Schwarz (of Seattle), and Tan Dun. 

In The Flute View, Denis expressed great worry and his sorrow at the state of things in his home country. While he and his parents are safe in the USA, many of his friends are not. He says he is usually a positive person, but watching what is happening in The Ukraine, he is not always positive.  But, he has hope that things will get better, and feels the present situation has taught the country about unity and the importance of freedom.

Let Me Be To Thee As The Circling Bird

Gerard Manley Hopkins

Let me be to Thee as the circling bird,
Or bat with tender and air-crisping wings
That shapes in half-light his departing rings,
From both of whom a changeless note is heard.
I have found my music in a common word,
Trying each pleasurable throat that sings
And every praised sequence of sweet strings,
And know infallibly which I preferred.
The authentic cadence was discovered late
Which ends those only strains that I approve,
And other science all gone out of date
And minor sweetness scarce made mention of:
I have found the dominant of my range and state—
Love, O my God, to call Thee Love and Love.

Great Blue Heron- Holly Wach

One of our favorite artists has a new, very beautiful, image of our Lady, this time, Undoer of Knots. He did the lovely painting of Our Lady of Seattle, a copy of which hangs in our chapel. Daniel says of the Undoer, he used influence of styles from Persian, Mexican, Gothic and Northumbro- Irish art.