My Lessons From the Passion of Edith Stein

1.

When you, dear Edith, rose in ascension
Out of a chimney at Auschwitz on the 9th of August 1942,
You went up straight and
Enormous into the sky
Like the pillar of smoke from Abel’s offering.

Silent, surely the best pupil of Husserl,
You understood even before the master
That one should stop playing the philosopher
When God approaches.

You went in silence,
Wise one becoming Teresa Benedicta of the Cross
When two brown-shirt anti-archangels
Wattled on the door of the convent calling:
Doctor Edith Stein.

Edith, did a short cry burst from you breast
When they tore off the black veil
Of the one betrothed to the Lamb?

2.

Dear Edith,

I’d like to ask you so many questions
Especially when the grace of meaning
Eeserts the pages of days
And the leaves even of wise books

When at first it seems
You answer me stubbornly
With a simple writing of smoke
And I am still afraid to understand.

3.

Dear Edith,

With every question you answer with:
Thy will be done
And how that must regulate the day
From morning to evening, the course
Of the year, and the entirety of life.

How only then will it be the sole
Concern of the Christian. All other
Concerns the Lord takes over. This
One alone, however, remains mine
As long as I live. And, sooner or later,

I began to realize this. In the childhood
Of my spiritual life, when I had just
Begun to allow myself to be directed
By God, I felt His guiding hand quite
Firmly and surely. But it didn’t always

Stay that way. Whoever belongs to Christ
Must go the whole way with him, you
Reminded me: I had to mature to adulthood:
I had to one day or other walk the way
Of the cross to Gethsemane and Golgotha.

And, Edith, it was you, who asked me:
Will you remain faithful to the Crucified?
Consider carefully, you warned, because
The world is in flames, the battle between
Christ and the Antichrist has broken

Into the open. And I knew that if I
Decided for Christ, it could cost me my life.
So I carefully considered what I promised.
And from then on, Before me hung
The Savior on the cross, because He became

Obedient to death on the cross. He came
Into the world not to do his own will, but
His Father’s will. And, because of you, Edith,
I knew that if I intended to be kindred to
The Crucified, I too must completely renounce

My own will and no longer have any desire
Except to fulfill God’s will. Deciding for Christ
Could cost me my life, as it did yours. The Savior
Hangs naked and destitute before me on
the cross because he has chosen all loss.

My Savior hangs before me with a pierced heart,
Spilling his heart’s blood to win my heart. You,
Edith, remind me, that to follow him in holy purity,
My heart must be free of every earthly desire, and
That Jesus, the Crucified, is to be the only object

Of my longings, my wishes, my thoughts. Edith,
The world is in flames, and I am impelled to put
Them out, but you remind me to look at the cross.
From that open heart gushes the blood
Of our Savior. This, you remind me, extinguishes

The flames of hell. And you remind me always of
How the eyes of the Crucified look down on me,
Asking, probing: Will you make your covenant
with the Crucified anew in all seriousness? What
Will you answer him? And because of you, Edith,

I will always answer: “Lord, where shall I go?
You have the words of eternal life.”

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