Relic of St. Maximilian comes to Chicopee, HolyokeDate: 6/10/2016 CHICOPEE – The relic of St. Maximilian Kolbe will be seen at a church with a strong personal history with the saint.
To note the 75th anniversary of his martyrdom, the Franciscan Friars Conventual of Our Lady of the Angels Province in concert with the International Council of the Militia of the Immaculate are sponsoring a pilgrimage of St. Maximilian’s relic.
Our Lady of the Cross in Holyoke will host the relic from June 17 through the 19, concluding at 2 p.m. with a Holy Hour. The relic will then move to St. Anthony’s Parish in Chicopee from June 21 through 23, which will include services in Spanish on June 22. Finally St. Stanislaus Basilica in Chicopee will welcome the relic on June 24 at 7 p.m. with a prayer service focusing on St. Maximilian as patron saint of people who are chemically addicted.
Father Joseph Benicewicz, OFM Conv., pastor of St. Stanislaus told Reminder Publications, “The relics connect us. Relics are connection to the saints themselves.”
He added people frequently view saints as “other worldly,” but relics “connect to a real person who lived and walked earth.”
Benicewicz said St. Maximilian “lived within the last century amid some of the worst atrocities mankind could inflict on humanity.”
 According to information supplied by the Franciscan Friars Conventual of Our Lady of the Angels Province, St. Maximilian was born in Poland as Raymond Kolbe on Jan. 8, 1894. He joined the Conventual Franciscan Friars and in the 1920’s and 1930’s he established the City Of the Immaculate, “Niepokalanow” outside Warsaw.
There he published religious tracts a monthly magazine and a newspaper with a circulation of 230,000. He also started a radio station.
The connection to St. Stanislaus in Chicopee came in the period in which Kolbe was seeking a printing press for his newspaper. Father Lawrence Cyman, then pastor of St. Stanislaus, was visiting the friars’ community. In what was supposed to be a joke, the fellow friars tried embarrassing Kolbe in front of Cyman, but the effort backfired. Cyman was impressed with the young friar and gave him $100 to help buy a press.
Upon arriving back in Chicopee, Cyman asked the parish to help him with additional donations.
In 1941, the Nazis took Kolbe prisoner and sent him to Auschwitz. After a successful escape by a person in his cellblock, the Nazi jailors selected 10 men to be executed. Kolbe asked to take the place of one those men and was given a lethal injection in August 1941.
Pope John Paul II canonized Maximilian in 1982. He is the patron saint of prisoners, journalists, families, volunteers, the pro-life movement and the chemically addicted.
Benicewicz said St. Maximilian was “an inspiration to his fellow prisoners.” He added there were members of the parish who remembered their connection with him.
The movie “Oceans of Mercy, which describes St. Maximilian’s life, his mission, and legacy, will be shown at St. Stanislaus School on June 26 following Mass and Veneration of the Relic. Father James McCurry appeared in the film and will discuss the film and the saint.
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