St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein)

Today's Saint was suggested by my sister and is a unique Saint in many ways.  Most people who take on a new name upon joining a religious order are known by that religious name when they are canonized as Saints:  St. Anthony, St. Junipero, Bl. Mother Teresa of Calcutta, St. John-Paul II, etc.  However, St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross is better known by her birth name of Edith Stein.

Edith was born on Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of Atonement, the youngest of 11 children of a strictly religious Jewish family. This date had deep symbolic meaning for Edith throughout her life. Her father died when she was little more than 2 years old. Her mother worked hard to raise her large family and instill in the children a faith in God. Despite her mother's efforts, Edith lost her faith in a personal God at a  young age.  Her faith was replaced by an intense search for the truth.

A very intelligent woman, Edith studied history and psychology in a search to become acquainted with the fundamentals of human existence. She then moved on to the study of phenomenology. She graduated summa cum laude with a doctorate in Philosophy, but her search for the truth found its ultimate satisfaction when she was visiting friends and came across the autobiography of St. Teresa of Avila.  This encounter with a Saint changed the course of her life.

Within a few months she was baptized.  She had it in mind to join the convent, but her spiritual director advised against it out of consideration for the feelings of her Jewish mother.  It was another ten years before she became a Carmelite, taking the name Teresa Benedicta of the Cross. As the Nazi power grew in Germany and anti-Semitism became more and more prevalent, Sr. Benedicta felt a great foreboding.  After the destruction and violence of Kristallnacht, the Carmelites moved Sr. Benedicta to a convent in Holland for her protection.  Her sister Rosa was also taken into the convent as a portress. 

As non-Christian Jews were being deported from Holland, to the horror of Dutch Christians, the Catholic Bishops of Holland also voiced their objections.  A very forceful pastoral letter from the Bishops was read from pulpits across the country on July 26, 1942. A week later, the Nazi response came as Catholic Jews and Jewish members of monasteries and convents were arrested.  On August 2, Sr. Benedicta and her sister Rosa were taken. They were eventually taken to the concentration camp at Auschwitz, where the two sisters died in the gas chamber on August 9.

Edith Stein's feast day is August 9.