Hello,
I would like to ask a question about Edith Stein. Particularly, I have read many references on the web indicating that she was executed in Auschwitz in a gas chamber. But how do we know of her method of death? Are there eyewitnesses to this? For instance, with St. Maximillian Kolbe, we have direct witnesses that he took someone's place to be punished by starvation. This was in response to an inmate escaping from the camp. But with Edith Stein, all I can find is people mentioning the gas chambers, but with no real historical evidence. By saying this, I don't mean to disparage her cause as a martyr in any way. She was obviously sent to the concentration camp because of her heroic faith. By historical standards, she obviously died at Auschwitz, but by what means? As it has come out more and more, we see that many of the deaths in the camps were as a result of disease, typhus carried by lice, lack of medicine, and malnutrition as a result of the food shortages in the last months resulting from the war.
So, is there real evidence of this? Am I just not looking in the right places? And, very important to me - as a Catholic - is it imperative that I believe she was gassed as opposed to being martyred? This may seem like a trivial point to some, but my conscience tells me that we should not propagate anything as a truth or further popular opinions, unless we have proof. I think it would be more balanced for the Church to say that she entered the Auschwitz camp, and there died for her faith, rather than to specify a method of death which there are no eyewitnesses to.
I ask this question with the utmost respect, and I hope I have not offended anyone's sensibilities with regards to atrocities committed in the Second World War.
I would like to ask a question about Edith Stein. Particularly, I have read many references on the web indicating that she was executed in Auschwitz in a gas chamber. But how do we know of her method of death? Are there eyewitnesses to this? For instance, with St. Maximillian Kolbe, we have direct witnesses that he took someone's place to be punished by starvation. This was in response to an inmate escaping from the camp. But with Edith Stein, all I can find is people mentioning the gas chambers, but with no real historical evidence. By saying this, I don't mean to disparage her cause as a martyr in any way. She was obviously sent to the concentration camp because of her heroic faith. By historical standards, she obviously died at Auschwitz, but by what means? As it has come out more and more, we see that many of the deaths in the camps were as a result of disease, typhus carried by lice, lack of medicine, and malnutrition as a result of the food shortages in the last months resulting from the war.
So, is there real evidence of this? Am I just not looking in the right places? And, very important to me - as a Catholic - is it imperative that I believe she was gassed as opposed to being martyred? This may seem like a trivial point to some, but my conscience tells me that we should not propagate anything as a truth or further popular opinions, unless we have proof. I think it would be more balanced for the Church to say that she entered the Auschwitz camp, and there died for her faith, rather than to specify a method of death which there are no eyewitnesses to.
I ask this question with the utmost respect, and I hope I have not offended anyone's sensibilities with regards to atrocities committed in the Second World War.