One would hardly expect a Christmas story to emerge from the violence and sadism of a Nazi concentration camp. Yet the birth of Christ and His subsequent sacrificial death for all men take on new meaning for me after learning of the heroic deed of a Roman Catholic priest at Auschwitz.

On February 17, 1941, Franciscan priest Maximillian Kolbe, the first apostle of Poland, was imprisoned by the Gestapo (secret state police) and soon after brought to Auschwitz. In those days it was the rule that ten innocent prisoners must die for one who escaped.

As the escape of a prisoner was noted during the role call at the end of July 1941, ten of Kolbe’s group had to die, and these in the most cruel way–by death from starvation. Among the ten who had been selected, without consideration, one cried aloud, “Have mercy! I have a wife and children.”

Kolbe stepped forward and offered himself to replace this head of a family and to go with the other nine into the hunger bunker. The commandant, surprised at such magnanimity, permitted the exchange.

So the priest went with the other nine into the cell of death and became their comforter and preacher, their leader and example. He endured the terrible sufferings from hunger and exhaustion in full consciousness during two weeks; then they gave him a deadly injection. He died on August 14.

Prisoner No. 16670 was dead, but he for whom he sacrificed himself still lives today. One hardly need point out the obvious application of Christ’s sacrifice on Calvary’s cross. He also died that we might live.

By Kenneth J. Holland, Signs of the Times, December 1987. With permission from Dale E. Galusha Pacific Press Ministries dalgal@pacificpress.com