Holy Hermit Edith Stein

Edith Stein - Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross or Saint Edith Stein - (12 October 1891 – 9 August 1942) was a German Jewish philosopher who converted to Christianity and became a Discalced Carmelite nun. She is canonised as a martyr and saint of the Catholic Church; she is also one of six patron saints of Europe.

Life

Edith Stein was born in Breslau (now Wrocław, Poland), Lower Silesia, into an observant Jewish family. She was the youngest of 11 children and was born on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Hebrew calendar. She was a very gifted child who enjoyed learning, in a home where her mother encouraged critical thinking, and she greatly admired her mother's strong religious faith. By her teenage years, however, Stein had become an agnostic.

In April 1913, Stein arrived at the University of Göttingen in order to study for the summer semester. By the end of the summer, she had decided to pursue her doctoral degree in philosophy and chose empathy as her thesis topic. Her studies were interrupted in July 1914 because of the outbreak of World War I. She then served as a volunteer wartime Red Cross nurse in an infectious diseases hospital at Mährisch Weißkirchen in 1915. In 1916, Stein moved to the University of Freiburg in order to complete her dissertation on Empathy.

While Stein had earlier contacts with Catholicism, it was her reading of the autobiography of the mystic Teresa of Ávila during summer holidays in Bad Bergzabern in 1921 that prompted her conversion and eventually the desire to seek the life of a Discalced Carmelite.

Baptised on 1 January 1922, and dissuaded by her spiritual advisers from immediately seeking entry to the enclosed and hidden life of a Carmelite nun, Stein obtained a position to teach at the Dominican nuns' school in Speyer from 1923 to 1931. While there, Stein translated Thomas Aquinas' De Veritate (Of Truth) into German, familiarised herself with Catholic philosophy in general.

Stein entered the Discalced Carmelite monastery St. Maria vom Frieden (Our Lady of Peace) in Cologne-Lindenthal in October 1933 and took the religious name Teresia Benedicta a Cruce (Teresa Benedicta of the Cross).

In Cologne she wrote her metaphysical book Endliches und ewiges Sein (Finite and Eternal Being), which attempted to combine the philosophies of Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus and Edmund Husserl. To avoid the growing Nazi threat, the Order transferred Edith and her sister, Rosa, who was also a convert and an extern sister of the Carmel, to the Discalced Carmelite monastery in Echt, Netherlands. There she wrote Studie über Joannes a Cruce: Kreuzeswissenschaft ("Studies on John of the Cross: The Science of the Cross”).

Even prior to the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands, Stein believed she would not survive the war, going so far as to write the Prioress to request her permission to "allow [Stein] to offer [her]self to the heart of Jesus as a sacrifice of atonement for true peace" and made a will. Her fellow sisters would later recount how Stein began "quietly training herself for life in a concentration camp, by enduring cold and hunger" after the Nazi invasion of the Netherlands in May 1940.

Ultimately, she would not be safe in the Netherlands. The Dutch Bishops' Conference had a public statement read in all churches across the nation on 20 July 1942 condemning Nazi racism. In a retaliatory response on 26 July 1942 the Reichskommissar of the Netherlands ordered the arrest of all Jewish converts who had previously been spared.

Along with two hundred and forty-three baptised Jews living in the Netherlands, Stein was arrested by the SS on 2 August 1942. Stein and her sister Rosa were imprisoned at the concentration camps of Amersfoort and Westerbork before being deported to Auschwitz.

A Dutch official at Westerbork was so impressed by her sense of faith and calm, he offered her an escape plan. Stein vehemently refused his assistance, stating: "If somebody intervened at this point and took away [her] chance to share in the fate of [her] brothers and sisters, that would be utter annihilation.”

On 7 August 1942, early in the morning, 987 Jews were deported to the Auschwitz concentration camp.

It was probably on 9 August that Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, her sister Rosa, and many more Jewish people were killed in a gas chamber.

Saying of St. Edith Stein  

Whatever did not fit in with my plan did lie within the plan of God. I have an ever deeper and firmer belief that nothing is merely an accident when seen in the light of God, that my whole life down to the smallest details has been marked out for me in the plan of Divine Providence and has a completely coherent meaning in God’s all-seeing eyes. And so I am beginning to rejoice in the light of glory wherein this meaning will be unveiled to me.  

Prayer of St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross:

“O my God, fill my soul with holy joy, courage and strength to serve You. Enkindle Your love in me and then walk with me along the next stretch of road before me. I do not see very far ahead, but when I have arrived where the horizon now closes down, a new prospect will open before me and I shall meet with peace.”

Sayings:

“To stand before the face of God—that is our vocation. . . . Our daily schedule ensures us of hours for solitary dialogue with the Lord, and these are the foundation of our life. . . . No human eye can see what God does in the soul during hours of inner prayer. It is grace upon grace. And all of life’s other hours are our thanks for them.” -- from The Hidden Life

“For by doing what God demands of us with total surrender of our innermost being, we cause the divine life to become our own inner life. Entering into ourselves, we find God in our own selves.”

“God Himself teaches us to go forward with our hand in His by means of the Church’s liturgy.”

“God is Truth. All who seek truth seek God, whether this is clear to them or not.”

“Prayer is the highest achievement of which the human spirit is capable.”

A few other quotes from her writings:

“The being of human beings is a composite of body, soul, and spirit”

"In emotions, we experience ourselves not only as existing but also as being such-and-such, the emotions manifest personal characteristics."

“Being open” means being able to engage what is other than oneself, stand over against it, turn toward it intentionally."

“We draw near to God by denying what he is not”

“the soul has a right to make decisions for itself”

“Each of us is perpetually on the razor’s edge: on one side, absolute nothingness; on the other, the fullness of divine life”

Feminist and Egalitarian

"The world doesn't need what women have, it needs what women are."

“The woman’s soul is fashioned as a shelter in which other souls may unfold.”

“Each woman who lives in the light of eternity can fulfill her vocation, no matter if it is in marriage, in a religious order, or in a worldly profession.”

“One could say that in case of need, every normal and healthy woman is able to hold a position. And there is no profession which cannot be practiced by a woman.”

"To speak to God is easier by nature for woman than for man because a natural desire lives in her to give herself completely to someone.” - Principles of Women’s Education

In summary, Stein held firm views about women’s and men’s specific natures. But woman’s role is not limited to being caretakers of the young and “helpmate” to man. Women have their own specific talents which may contribute to social and public life in many different ways, based on their individuality. She also held that women were by nature not just public actors but also had a specific responsibility for children. Moreover, women were more in tune with their affective lives, and the highest expression of their essence was in self-giving love. Thus, she believed in the equal but complementary status of males and females." from Edith Stein (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)