​Sr. Catherine Marie Michael


I recently watched the the film, Triumph of the Heart, about St. Maximilian Kolbe’s experience
in the Auschwitz concentration camp. Because a prisoner escaped, other prisoners are chosen
to go into solitary confinement without food, and Fr. Kolbe takes the place of a man who has a
family. Through his faith in God he is given, throughout the action of the film, the grace to rest in
the peace of Christ and persevere in love.

In the camp, the Nazi guards determine the conditions of their lives and threaten to control how
they react and how they view themselves, as if it was an experiment. Fr. Kolbe encourages his
cellmates to pass the time singing songs that remind them of their heritage and identity, which
further gives those who hear them, courage in knowing that they are not alone in the struggle to
not be defined by their captors who perceive them as no better than beasts. It becomes
understood that other prisoners who were confined in the cell before them had gone insane, and
when their bodies were removed they had bite marks which showed that they bit one another
out of starvation. It would seem that the powerful have supreme authority over those whom they
deem less valuable. Power gives them the authority to determine the circumstances of what is
true, without the need to seek Truth, the overarching meaning of life, as long as they are able to
rule. In their comfort they have the luxury of indifference (cf. C.S.Lewis). Like Pilate during
Christ’s Passion, asking “What is truth?” as the God-Man stands before him, there is a clash
between what is asserted to be true by worldly men and the Creator who is the Source and
Author of the Truth about all that exists, the authoritative Word (John 18:38).

Fr. Kolbe knows the reality of heaven because he cannot deny an encounter he had with Mary,
the Mother of God, and he adheres to that reality through prayer, asking for Mary’s intercession
to give him the words needed to convert his cell-mates’ hearts. The prisoners with their own
stories and personalities eventually accept Fr. Kolbe’s offer of hearing their confessions. One of
the prisoners confesses that he told a woman who ended up to be a spy, the names of leaders
subversive to the Third Reich, and that he included Fr. Kolbe’s name on the list. In this moment
of budding tension it seems that Fr. Kolbe could become angry with the man, but he realizes
that it was God’s will that he serve Him by being there, that he was meant to be there for them,
so he is able to personally forgive and to act in persona Christi, absolving their sins.

By His authority to forgive sins, Christ exercises the might of Divine Authority and extends to us
His generous love and mercy. Although the fallen world’s insanity closes in on them, Fr. Kolbe
ministers to his cellmates so that they might rely on the peace that only Christ can give and be
resolute in their shared struggle out of exile, a crucible marked by cruelty and suffering. Fr.
Kolbe prompts them to finish the race well, to accept and know Christ as Savior, to trust that He
has ultimate authority and to follow Him, the Shepherd of Souls. Given the gift of life entrusted
to them, they are offered time to seek and love God and to further choose to live in this fallen
world in obedience to God’s laws, so that their final actions with the help of God’s grace,
preserve the dignity and original beauty of their souls (cf. CCC 1701). They seem to be
enlightened with a flash of understanding, that God created each person to belong in His love
and for a divine purpose that exceeds fallen man’s limitations, not for insanity, despair, and
death, and that each of their lives matters to God (cf. Mark 12:17; May, Ch 6). They struggle to
not to be defined by despair, so that in heaven they may share the joy of the victory of life over
death that Christ accomplished so that all might be saved.

Fr. Kolbe clings to the Truth of the Catholic faith. Truth however, is not abstract. Truth is a
Person and by abiding in Truth we can find peace and sanity no matter what suffering and
insanity exists in the shadow of death (cf. Luke 1:68-79; Wiley, p. 45). We find rest in the Prince
of Peace who, in humility took on our human nature to elevate us through participation in His
divine nature, giving us His very self (2Peter 1:4). By His grace we are healed with renewed
minds in Christ (Rom 12: 2). We enter into the life of grace which is participation in God’s very
life and are given refuge in His will which is the way of peace, no longer slaves to sin and death,
but sons and daughters of God, free to inherit eternal life.


Triumph of the Heart, The Passion of St. Maximilian Kolbe was written and directed by Anthony
D’Ambrosio. Thank you to The Basilica of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Baltimore for
hosting the screening of the film in September 2025. https://www.triumphoftheheart.com/

References:
Lewis, C.S., The Screwtape Letters, ISBN 0006280609.
May, William, An Introduction to Moral Theology, 2nd edition, Our Sunday Visitor Publishing Div, 2003,
Ch. 6.
Sheed, Frank, Theology and Sanity, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, 1993.
Wiley, P. et al, The Catechism of the Catholic Church and the Craft of Catechesis, Ignatius Press, San
Francisco, 2008, Ch 3, pp. 45-46, Doctrine is personal.
CCC = Catechism of the Catholic Church, ISBN 0-385-50819-0.

                                                                                               by Brother Thomas Aquinas


Three college roommates rented an apartment after graduation and were in need of furniture to
replace the pieces that had been provided by campus dorms. Besides purchases for the living and
dining areas, each bought a self-assemble bedframe for his bedroom. Upon beginning to
assemble the bedframes, however, they found the accompanying instructions to be confusing and
not immediately clear.

The first roommate, seeing no help in the instructional guide, threw it away and began forcing
the various pieces together as he saw fit. In the process, some of the components cracked or
broke and had to be discarded as well. When he was finished, he found that his mattress did not
fit properly on the frame because parts of it had been bent in order to fit certain connections
together. And when he laid down to sleep, the poorly built frame could not support the weight it
was designed for and collapsed beneath him.

The second roommate initially set aside the assembly instructions as well but carefully examined
each piece of the kit so as to make sense for himself of the purpose of each. He observed subtle
differences between some components that the first roommate had ignored and ascertained which
fit properly together with which others. But after struggling many hours he could not determine
how one final piece was to be used and, exhausted from the day’s efforts, finally consulted the
instructions. He successfully completed the bedframe but slept poorly, since he had stayed up
late in the night to finish it.

The third roommate, also puzzled initially, studied the full instruction booklet and discovered a
link to the manufacturer’s website with a step-by-step video explaining in great detail each step
of the assembly process. He watched the entire process before replaying the video and following
along, finishing in what seemed almost no time at all. Pleasantly surprised by how simple the
assembly turned out to be, he organized his other belongings and went to sleep early.

---------------
There are some who suppose God to be an arbitrary dictator who issues laws in order to restrict
our behavior. While we certainly are commanded to avoid all forms of sin, God’s laws take the
form not of meaningless constraints but rather an instruction manual, of sorts, for flourishing as a
human being. The bedframe manufacturer understands the design and assembly process of the
bedframe that each roommate bought and provided instructions so that they could use it for its
intended purpose. More eminently, as the author of human nature, God knows which acts will
lead us closer to or further from him, and His laws guide us in choosing the former, that we
might become more like Him, the end for which He made us.

God has written His law on the human heart (see Jer 31:33, Rom 2:15), but in our fallen state it
can be difficult to recognize them as such. Indeed, although the natural law can be discovered
through human reason, on our own this would only come through much time and effort,
requiring errors to be corrected along the way. Thus, in His merciful love for us, God also reveals
His law in the Ten Commandments and in Church teaching, that we might take confidence in his
guidance and more surely seek ever to grow closer to Him in this life and the next.
​

                                                     by Brother Dominicus




Brad Gregory is the Dorothy G. Griffin Collegiate Chair in European
History at the University of Notre Dame. He is an "old-fashioned" historian
who combines narrative and analysis in clear and engaging prose. His
books focus on the reformation era. He paints a lively picture of important
Reformation figures, the historical context, and the development of the
early movement to reform Catholicism to the panoply of protestant sects
that developed later.

His book The Unintended Consequences of the Reformation: How a
Religious Revolution Secularized Society illustrates that good intentions
might just pave the road to hell. The Church has always had its issues. Sin,
being part of human nature, is inescapably part of the Church, and because
of that, there are almost always movements to reform it—to make it more
holy.

The Church and culture in which Martin Luther was born was in
transition. It was still generally culturally accepted that man was sinful but
that God saved the world. He sent his son Jesus to the world to redeem it.
He is the way, the truth, and the life. He opens the door to the Father and
eternal life for us. It was, therefore, very important to believe the right things
about God. Life on earth is very short, life after death is eternal. If you
believe and do the wrong things for 40, 50, 60, or 70 years on earth, you
might suffer forever in the hereafter.

The "founding fathers" of the Reformation were driven by a deep
desire for the truth and a deep fear of the consequences of getting it wrong.
However, because of their effort to loosen the "truth" from the community
and history of the Church, they subjectivized truth. They personally knew
better than that sinful institution. 

It quickly became clear that reading merely the Bible (Sola Scriptura)
does not lead to consensus. It leads to competing truth claims. It leads to
Lutherans, Calvinists, Anabaptists, Puritans, Quakers, etc. In history, it
contributed to actual wars of religion. Wars that were fought because, in the
eyes of the participants, their salvation was at stake. As a solution to stop
the bloodshed of the horrific wars of religion, the idea grew that different
religious truths needed to be accepted. If there is no way to decide which
religion is true, then we need to find ways for religions to live next to each
other. First, that was done by creating states where a particular religion
ruled. This toleration became interpreted in subjective terms (we now would
say as religious indifference). It ultimately led to our modern secular states
where no religious truth or any "truth" is generally accepted.

So the irony is that Luther, Calvin, etc., who despised the failings of
the Catholic Church and desperately wanted to understand the truth about
God and create a more Godly Christian society, achieved the opposite
result. 

Gregory's work is worth engaging with. It provided me personally
some cautionary notes to think about in trying to evaluate the ever-present
movements in the Church that seek to purify it.



Literature list:

Brad Gregory, The Unintended Consequences of the Reformation: How a
Religious Revolution Secularized Society, Belknap Press, 2015

Brad Gregory, Rebel in the Ranks, Martin Luther, the Reformation and the
Conflicts that Continue to Shape our World, HarperOne, 2017

Brad Gregory, Salvation at Stake, Christian Martyrdom in Early Modern
Europe, Harvard University Press, 2001

                                               ​by Brother Dominicus

​I have been intrigued by the work of Flannery O'Connor for a very
long time. I also have been puzzled by her claims that her work is
thoroughly Christian, even Thomistic. After all, Thomas is the supremely
confident, holy thinker who serenely seeks truth. A well-ordered man who seems to be the textbook example of the notion that grace can perfect the fertile ground of the natural virtues he pursues. Her stories, however, are gory and graphic, and very few of the characters seem to have any
redeeming qualities (let alone virtues). They kill, cheat, deceive. They are,
in general, not nice Christian folks. Nevertheless, they are extremely well-
written and seem to embody the South. But they did not leave me feeling
that they were "watered and fed by Dogma."

Recently, I relented and finally bought the book Thinking Through
Aquinas, Essays on God, Humanity and Christ by Frederick Bauerschmidt.
It is a good book with several excellent essays. I warmly recommend it.
After years of being befuddled, his essay on O'Connor gave me personally,
a satisfactory handle on her.

She is a self-conscious modernist writer in the Southern Grotesque
style. She is aware that her readers in modern-day America are not
religiously inclined. She knows that "If you live today, you breathe in
nihilism". We live in an age in which "the moral sense has been bred off
sections of the population like the wings of certain chickens to produce
white meat on them".

O'Connor knows that for more and more people in our time, God is
dead. She does not write like Thomas for a general religious people. So,
how do you reach modern non-religious people? In her stories, the random
violence committed by her characters (who certainly do not strive for
natural virtues) is often accompanied by unexpected revelations.
Bauerschmidt suggests that "Perhaps she hopes that if goodness and
beauty cannot themselves be perceived they might be glimpsed in their
shadows—the evil and ugliness of which the modern world seems so
enamored". In her work this is the way she tries to speak (preach?) to the
people, ad gentes not just against the people, contra gentes. Something at
the heart of the Dominican vocation!

Bauerschmidt’s essay gave me the key to understand her work
and her Thomism in this paragraph (22):

          As O’Connor said, a hillbilly Thomist is likely to be mistaken for
          a hillbilly nihilist precisely because she seeks a way of proclaiming the
          Gospel through the guileful use of the nihilist’s own idiom of distortion.
          But in robbing the modern world of its smug certainties, one might be
          seen offering the abyss of nothingness rather than the abyss of faith.
          She seeks to show that the human will cannot master the void, or even
          play safely within it, in order to open up the possibility that the void has
          already been mastered. She induces an awareness of lostness so that
          we may recognize ourselves as found.


Frederick Bauerschmidt, Thinking Through Aquinas, Essays on God,
Humanity and Christ, Word on Fire Academic, 2024