A brilliant philosopher who stopped believing in God when she was 14, Edith Stein was so captivated by reading the autobiography of Teresa of Avila (October 15) that she began a spiritual journey that led to her Baptism in 1922. Twelve years later she imitated Teresa by becoming a Carmelite, taking the name Teresa Benedicta of the Cross.
Born into a prominent Jewish family in Breslau (now Wroclaw, Poland), Edith abandoned Judaism in her teens. As a student at the University of Göttingen, she became fascinated by phenomenology, an approach to philosophy. Excelling as a protégé of Edmund Husserl, one of the leading phenomenologists, Edith earned a doctorate in philosophy in 1916. She continued as a university teacher until 1922 when she moved to a Dominican school in Speyer; her appointment as lecturer at the Educational Institute of Munich ended under pressure from the Nazis.
On 14 October 1933, at age 42, Edith Stein entered the Carmelite Convent in Cologne and took the religious name, Teresa Benedicta a Cruce — Teresa, Blessed of the Cross — reflecting her special devotion to the Passion of Christ, Teresa of Avila, and John of the Cross.
After living in the Cologne Carmel (1934-38), she moved to the Carmelite monastery in Echt, Netherlands. The Nazis occupied that country in 1940. In retaliation for being denounced by the Dutch bishops, the Nazis arrested all Dutch Jews who had become Christians.
In 1933, she sought help from the Vatican for her Jewish community. Her life and writings focused on the mystery of joy in suffering, of victory in failure, and of dying and rising with Christ.
Teresa Benedicta and her sister Rosa, also a Catholic, died in a gas chamber in Auschwitz on August 9, 1942 having been sent to the death camp when she refused to deny her Jewish heritage.
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