Pope Benedict's Wednesday Audience for August 13 2008 (Talks Saints Edith Stein and Maximilian Kolbe )

Pope Benedict caught me off guard today. I was under the impression while he was on vacation there would be no General Wednesday Audiences. Well they had one today. This is a short one because the where he is out he can not sit down while giving his remarks. The Ratzinger Forum has a translation up.


Here is a translation of the Holy Father's words at the abbreviated General Audience today, speaking from the balcony overlooking the inner courtyard of the Apostolic Palace in Castel Gandolfo:

Dear brothers and sisters! Having returned from Bressanone, where I spent a period of repose, I am happy to meet and greet you again, dear residents of Castel Gandolfo, and all you pilgrims who have come today to visit me.


I wish to thank once more those who welcomed me and watched over my sojourn in the mountains. They were days of serene relaxation, during which I did not cease to remember to the Lord all those who have entrusted themselves to my prayers. There are really so many people who write asking me to pray for them. They tell me about their joys but also about their concerns, their plans in life, their problems at home and at work, the expectations and the hopes that they carry, along with the stresses arising from the uncertainties that mankind is living at this time.


I can give my assurance that I remember each and everyone in prayer, especially in the daily celebration of Holy Mass and in reciting the Rosary. I know very well that the first service I can render to the Church and to mankind is precisely that of prayer, because in praying, I confidently place in the hands of the Lord the ministry which he himself has entrusted to me, along with the destinies of the entire ecclesial and civilian community.


Whoever prays never loses hope, even when he finds himself in difficult situations, even those which are humanly hopeless. This is what Sacred Scripture teaches us, and this is what the history of the Church testifies to.


How many examples, in fact, could we state in which it was prayer which sustained the saints and the Christian people along their way! Among the witnesses in our time, I wish to cite two saints whom we remember these days: Teresa Benedetta della Croce, Edith Stein, whose feast we celebrated on August 9, and Maximilian Maria Kolbe whom we commemorate tomorrow, August 14, eve of the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.


Both ended their earthly life in martyrdom at the Auschwitz concentration camp. Their life can ostensibly be considered a defeat, but it is precisely in their martyrdom that the splendour of love shines to defeat the shadows of selfishness asnd hatred. The following words attributed to St. Maximilian Kolbe were said in the full furor of Nazi persecution: "Hatred is not a creative force. Only love is." And heroic proof of that love was the generous offer he made of himself in place of one of his prison companions, an offer that ended in his death in the 'bunker of hunger' on August 14, 1941.


Edith Stein, on August 6 of the following year, three days before her tragic end, said to some of her fellow nuns at the monastery of Echt in the Netherlands: "I am ready for everything. Jesus is here among us. Up to now, I have been able to pray very well and I have said with all my heart, 'Ave, Cruz, spes unica' (Welcome, Cross, the only hope'). Witnesses who managed to escape the horrible massacre recounted that Theresia Benedicta of the Cross, as she walked consciously towards her death dressed in her Carmelite habit, was distinguished by her peaceful and serene manner, and by her calm attentiveness to the needs of everyone. <
Prayer was the secret of this sainted co-Patroness of Europe, who "after having reached the truth in the peace of contemplative life, had to live to the very end the mystery of the Cross" (Apostolic Letter Spes aedificandi, Teachings of John Paul II, XX, 2, 1999, p. 511). "Ave Maria!": This was the last invocation on the lips of St. Maximilian Kolbe, as he held out his arms to the man who killed him with an injection of phenolic acid. It is moving to remark how the humble and confident recourse to


Our Lady is always a source of courage and peace. As we prepare to celebrate the solemnity of the Assumption - one of the Marian feasts that are most dear to Christian tradition - let us renew our trust in her who watches over us every moment from heaven with maternal love. This, in effect, is what we say every time in the familiar prayer of the Hail Mary, asking her to pray for us 'now and at the hour of our death'.

The Holy Father then gave greetings in several languages, citing particular groups present, and wishing everyone a good week and a happy feast day of the Assumption.