Carmelite Saints | St. Teresa Benedicta

St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross

An estimated six million Jews and four million Christians died in the Holocaust. One of these was Edith Stein (Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, O.C.D.), philosopher, scholar, Carmelite nun, and now – canonized saint. Edith was the eleventh child of Siegfried and Augusta Stein. She was born in Breslau, Germany, into an observant Jewish family on the “Day of Atonement” which fell that year on October 12, 1891. As a young child, she was described as “headstrong and saucy.” By age seven, her contemplative spirit became apparent when she began to speak of a sweet hidden life within her.

Although Edith was brilliant and at the top of her class consistently, she dropped out of school when she was fourteen. Her principal, seeing her academic potential and the high caliber of her schoolwork, was utterly disgusted. During the following ten months, which she spent helping her sister Else with her first child, Edith lost her faith and began what she called her “search for the truth.” It led her to the university, the study of phenomenology, a doctorate in philosophy, summa cum laude, and a brilliant career as a phenomenologist. She considered herself an atheist and wrote, “My only prayer now is my search for the truth.”

One evening she picked up a book, a German translation of the Autobiography of St. Teresa and read it in one night. When she finished reading, she closed the book and exclaimed, “This is truth.” She soon became a Catholic and then entered Carmel in 1933, receiving the name Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross. When the Holocaust was reaching its darkest days, she was discovered by Hitler’s S.S. agents and, together with her sister Rosa, was taken to a concentration camp on August 2, 1942. One of the witnesses reported that, as they walked hand in hand to the corner to board the waiting van, Edith (Sister Benedicta of the Cross) said to Rosa, “Come, let us go for our people.” They died at Auschwitz on August 9, 1942, from Zyklon B poison gas. The Red Cross, eight years later, confirmed the date of their deaths.

A prolific writer as well as a brilliant scholar, Sister
Benedicta of the Cross has left many books and other writings to us. In her writings, she delves assiduously into truth and investigates the deeper questions of life. Who am I? Why am I here? Where am I going?

Pope John Paul II beatified Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross on May 1, 1987, and canonized her on Oct. 11, 1998.