Saint Maximilian Kolbe

Kolbe was born in Poland in 1894, joined the Conventual Franciscans, and became known before the Second World War for founding a large friary and a prolific Catholic publishing operation. When Nazi Germany occupied Poland, his friary sheltered thousands of refugees, including Jews, before he was arrested and eventually sent to Auschwitz in 1941. When a prisoner escaped from his barracks, camp guards selected ten men to die by starvation in reprisal. When one of the chosen men cried out for his wife and children, Kolbe stepped forward and offered to take his place; the guards accepted. He survived nearly two weeks in the starvation bunker before being killed by lethal injection. The man he saved, Franciszek Gajowniczek, survived the camp and lived for decades afterward, attending Kolbe's canonization in 1982.