Saint Maximilian Kolbe

[Hektor]

...
We have a death certificate for Maximilian Kolbe. Where are the other fourteen?



Todesursache: Myocardinsuffizienz (Cause of Death: Heart Failure)

The rest is legend. I'll believe it when I see it.

I recall having read something of an medical record of Maximilan Kolbe also noting a rather expensive treatment with X-rays. The source I do not remember. Does someone know more?

[Horhug]

I recall having read something of an medical record of Maximilan Kolbe also noting a rather expensive treatment with X-rays. The source I do not remember. Does someone know more?

Carlos Whitlock Porter: The Image of the Germans in Polish Literature

Now. The German occupation troops had already withdrawn from Poland by January - February 1945. But the last "eyewitness" kept the secret of the Kolbe's death all to himself until the end of December; that is, no one showed any interest in the manner of Kolbe's death until then, obviously because there was nothing remarkable about it. From December 1945 onwards, however, it was different. The death records -- i.e., documents from the internment period -- were unfortunately lost, but a "death certificate" is available. There was also a last "eyewitness", and he was alleged to have made this report. I have spoken to a doctor about this report. Here is what he says:

1. No healthy man, let alone someone suffering from tuberculosis, could survive 2 or even 3 weeks naked in a dark cell, on a bare cement floor, without any food or water. Thirst and cold would have caused very rapid death.

2. The latrines are said to have been dry and empty because the prisoners allegedly drank their own urine due to severe thirst. But if they had done that, they would have died much more quickly, since all the toxic substances of the body are concentrated in the urine, which is excreted precisely so that the body may be free of these toxins. If the prisoners had satisfied their thirst in this unappetizing manner, they would have re-ingested these toxins into their bodies, and would have rapidly died from poisoning. (A question from the doctor: if the latrines were dry and empty, did they also eat their own excrement? Even when they suffered from diarrhoea, which would have been inevitable?)

3. After 3 weeks naked on a cold cement floor with active tuberculosis, Kolbe allegedly continued to stand or kneel in the middle of the cell, praying loudly, consoling his last fellow prisoners! And all this time, they never received a drop of water! That would have been impossible even for a Hercules.

4. The last 4 prisoners are said to have been killed with an injection in the left hand, with carbolic acid, no less. This was surely the first time in the history of medicine that carbolic acid has ever been used for such a purpose; to a doctor, this is completely incredible.

5. The witness reported that any violation of secrecy about the building was punishable by death, that is, the killing was to remain secret. But carbolic acid is a strongly-smelling substance which betrays its own presence.

And now I must add a 6th objection. The death records were lost, of course, but the X-ray records survived. According to these records, Kolbe was X-rayed on two occasions, on 28 July 1941 for the last time! The witness speaks of confinement in a dark cell for 3 weeks, from July to 14 August 1941. That means that Kolbe was taken out of his dark cell to be given a quick X-ray, just before his intended murder! What curious people these Germans are!

The fact that Kolbe was X-rayed on 28 July 1941 proves that his active tuberculosis was given medical treatment, and that he was not held in any "death bunker", since it is inconceivable that the Germans would have taken him out to X-ray him. This therefore proves that the letter from this "Borgowiec" is a fabrication. The purpose of the fabrication is clearly revealed at the end of the sworn statement of the person for whom Kolbe allegedly sacrificed his life. This sworn statement is dated even later than the Borgowiec's statement, i.e, 25 October 1946, more than 5 years after the alleged events! It does do not restrict itself to the facts, but extends to Kolbe's future beatification and canonization, which is obviously the purpose for which the statement was drawn up and written.

...

http://www.cwporter.com/image.htm

Rajmund Kolbe is reported elsewhere to have been disgnosed with tuberculosis in 1919 and I read somewhere that he'd had a lung removed !

Though suffering from tuberculosis and a collapsed lung ...

http://archive.catholicherald.co.uk/art ... th-century

In 1919 he was diagnosed as having tuberculosis and returned to a newly independent Poland.

http://livingspace.sacredspace.ie/F0814s/

[Eduardo]

It is a pity that most of the links compiled in this thread are broken. Can anybody recover the info reported in these links?

[Hektor]

It is a pity that most of the links compiled in this thread are broken. Can anybody recover the info reported in these links?

Isn't there sites that do that?
With the volume of materials being processed lots of the info may get lost again of course.

I recall lots of Mythology about Max. Kolbe. And it is different from what can be learned from primary documentation.
Something that he sacrificed him for another Pole.

You can actually get hair (supposedly his) as relics to venerate:

6. You can acquire relics of St. Maximilian.
Though St. Maximilian’s body was incinerated at Auschwitz, there are first class relics available for veneration. Years before the saint’s death, a somewhat prescient barber in his community started saving clippings of Fr. Kolbe’s hair and beard. Parishes may obtain a first class relic for public veneration through Niepokalanów. The community can also accommodate requests for second class relics and provide prayer cards with relics.
https://www.wordonfire.org/articles/9-t ... ian-kolbe/

Having had the bad luck of dying in Auschwitz can get you sainthood and become the object of idolization nowadays.
That the story of 'collecting hair clippings years before his death' isn't exactly believable is of course another matter. I wonder how many relics they have already sold to gullible Catholics?


A sober approach cuts through the Holocaust like through air.