Maximillian Kolbe was a Polish priest killed by the nazis with a lethal injection on August 14 at the age of 47.

When at Auschwitz, he volunteered to die in place of a stranger, Franciszck Gajowniczek, who had a wife and children.

Kolbe and others were put in a starvation bunker without food and water. After two weeks everyone in the cell had died but him. The prison authorities then gave him a lethal injection on August 14, 1941.

Before dying he pronounced to words. “Ave Maria.”

Maximillian Kolbe had a great love and devotion to the Blessed Mother and began the Knights of the Immaculata, a worldwide evangelization movement that encourages total consecration to the Blessed Virgin Mary as a means of spiritual renewal for individuals and society.

He was described as “a martyr of love” by St Pope Paul VI.

St Maximillian Kolbe, teach us to surrender ourselves to Mary as you did and to live our lives as slaves of love.