Homily for August 9-10, 2008
Father Tom’s Homily
19th Sunday
August 10, 2008
August 9th is the feast of St. Edith Stein. She was born in Germany of Jewish parents in 1891 on Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, a fact whose significance she later noted.
Independent by nature and gifted with a prodigious intelligence, Edith abandoned her family’s Jewish faith at age 13, declaring herself an atheist.
She devoted herself to the study of philosophy and received her doctorate at age 23. At age 30, moved by a growing interest in religion, she read the autobiography of St. Teresa of Avila, a 16th century mystic who belonged to the Carmelite religious order. A few months later she was baptized a Catholic, much to the dismay of her parents.
As the Nazis rose to power, Edith understood the terrible storm that was approaching for Jews. She felt her Jewish-Christian identity imposed a unique calling on her. She wrote in her journal: “I spoke to the Savior to tell him that I realized it was his cross that was now being laid upon the Jewish people. And that the few who understood this had the responsibility of carrying it in the name of all, and that I myself was willing to do this.”
In 1934, at age 41, Edith joined the Carmelite community in Cologne taking the name Sister Teresa Benedicta a Cruce (Sister Teresa Blessed by the Cross), referring to the fate the Jewish people were beginning to experience.
Four years later, believing her presence in the convent endangered the whole community there, she allowed herself to be smuggled out of the country to a Carmelite convent in Holland.
In 1940 the Nazis occupied Holland. As a Jew she was required to wear the Yellow Star of David on her habit. She was consoled by the presence of her sister Rosa, who by this time had also become a Catholic and lived in the convent with her as a laywoman.
The Nazis had indicated a willingness to spare Jewish-Christians in Holland provided the churches kept silent. When in July 1942, a statement by the Catholic bishops of Holland denouncing the persecution of the Jews was read from pulpits throughout the country, the Nazis retaliated with rage. Within a week all Jewish Catholics, including members of religious orders, were arrested.
On the evening of August 2, 1942, the doors of the Carmelite convent in the Dutch village of Echt opened, and a middle-aged nun calmly stepped from within the cloister accompanied by two Gestapo officers to a long, sleek sedan.
To her distraught sister at her side, Edith said, “Come Rosa. We’re going for our people.”
From a detention camp in Holland, they were shipped with other Jews to an extermination camp. Wearing her Carmelite habit, Edith was sealed into a crowded boxcar for a wretched journey to a concentration camp in Westerbok.
Then several days later one of her former students saw her on the station platform about to board another boxcar. Edith said, “Give my love to the sisters at St. Magdalena. I am traveling eastward.”
Eight days after her arrest, on August 9, 1942, Edith and Rosa were stripped naked and disappeared with other Jews into the gas chamber at Auschwitz. Edith was 42 years of age.
Today’s gospel story about the frightened disciples crossing a stormy sea in a boat is addressed to all who for one reason or another are living in fear. We may be fearful because of personal dangers or worries about our future or sickness or loss of those we love.
Like the disciples huddled in fear in the boat being tossed about in the dark angry waters, we cry out in fear. Jesus says to us, “Take courage, it is I. Do not be afraid.”
Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross seemed to be calm as she was being shipped to a very cruel death. She was given the gift of courage from the company of Jesus, the Crucified One.
August 9th is also the anniversary of the destruction of the city of Nagasaki by a nuclear bomb. This came three days after the destruction of another Japanese city, Hiroshima, in the destructive fury of another atom bomb.
A prominent building in the middle of Nagasaki was the target of the bomb. It was the Catholic cathedral, the largest Catholic cathedral in Asia. Some scientists estimate that the temperature of the fireball that swallowed up both cities was approximately 100 million degrees.
For the four months prior to the use of the atom bombs, U.S. bombers had laid waist 67 major Japanese cities with incendiary firebombs. No effort was made to avoid civilian casualties. It is estimated that over 900,000 civilians died in all the bombings.
It is difficult to imagine the human misery that has resulted in modern warfare. Great cruelty is made possible when we do not recognize the image of God in one another and chose to be deaf to their pain.
St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross chose to be in solidarity with her own people in their darkest hour. Understanding our Crucified Lord’s solidarity with those who suffer, she stood serene in midst of the storm of the Holocaust. With Jesus she has arrived at the safety of the far shore.
In today’s gospel story, Jesus tells us “Take courage, it is I. Do not be afraid.” He is our Crucified Brother who accompanies us through life’s many storms.
