| December
2013/January 2014 - Vol. 71
The
Name Jesus
Excerpted
from Alfred Delp's diary entry,
January
1, 1945
Jesus. The name of our Lord and of my Order [The Society
of Jesus] shall be the first word I write in the New Year. The name stands
for all the things I desire when I pray, believe and hope; for inner and
outer redemption; for relaxation of all the selfish tensions and limitations
I place in the way of the free dialogue with God, all the barriers to voluntary
partnership and surrender without reserve: and for a speedy release from
these horrible fetters. The whole situation is so palpably unjust; things
I have neither done nor even known about are keeping me here in prison.
"
The name Jesus stands also for all that I intended to do in the world,
and still hope to do among mankind. To save, to stand by ready to give
immediate help, to have goodwill towards all men, and to serve them. I
still owe much to so many.
And in conclusion the Order, too, is embraced in my invocation of this
name - the Order which has admitted me to its membership. May it be personified
in me. I have pledged myself to Jesus as his loving comrade and blood-brother.
The Name stands for passionate faith, submission, selfless effort and
service.
Go
to next meditation > No
Death Can Kill Us
Return to Joy
in the Face of Death - Alfred Delp S.J., by Jeanne Kun, with excerpts
from the book, Even Unto Death: Wisdom from Modern Martyrs, edited by
Jeanne Kun, The Word Among Us Press, © 2002. All rights reserved.
Used with permission. The book can be ordered from WAU
Press. |
A
selection of prison meditations
by
Alfred Delp
Commemorative
stamp in honor of Delp, Germany, 1964
Alfred
Delp was a German member of the Society of Jesus, who was executed for
his resistance to the Nazi regime.
Alfred
Delp was born in Mannheim, Germany, to a Catholic mother and a Protestant
father. Although baptized Catholic, he was raised and confirmed a Lutheran.
At the age of 14 he left the Lutheran church and was confirmed as a Roman
Catholic. In his later life Delp was a fervent promoter of better relations
between the churches.
Delp
joined the Jesuits in 1926. In the next 10 years he continued his studies
and worked with German youth, made more difficult after 1933 with the interference
of the Nazi regime. Delp was ordained in 1937.
Unable
for political reasons to continue his studies, Delp worked on the editorial
staff of the Jesuit publication Stimmen der Zeit (Voice of the Times),
until it was suppressed in 1941. He then was assigned as rector of St.
Georg Church in Munich. Delp secretly used his position to help Jews escape
to Switzerland.
Concerned
with the future of Germany, Delp joined the Kreisau Circle, a group that
worked to design a new social order. He was arrested with other members
of the circle after the attempted assassination of Hitler in 1944. After
suffering brutal treatment and torture, Delp was brought to trial. While
he knew nothing of the attempted assassination, the Gestapo decided to
hang him for high treason.
Delp
was offered his freedom if he would renounce the Jesuits. He refused and
was hanged February 2, 1945. His body was cremated and his ashes spread
on an unknown field.
While
his physical remains disappeared, Alfred Delp left behind letters smuggled
out of prison. They reveal a man of courage who told the prison chaplain
accompanying him to his death, “In half an hour, I’ll know more than you
do.”
[biographical
source: IgnatianSpirituality.com]
[Selection
from The Prison Meditations of Father Alfred Delp, with an Introduction
by Thomas Merton (New York: Herder and Herder, 1963)] |
