Contact: Rose Trabbic, Publicist, Ignatius Press, 239-867-4180, rose@ignatius.com

SAN FRANCISCO, May 18 /Christian Newswire/ -- A fascinating new book just released from Ignatius Press, "Edith Stein and Companions: On the Way to Auschwitz", recounts the inspirational stories of the Catholic Jewish martyrs.

On the same summer day in 1942, Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein) and hundreds of other Catholic Jews were arrested in Holland by the occupying Nazis. Of those arrested, 113 (several of them priests and nuns) perished at Auschwitz and other concentration camps. They were murdered in retaliation for the anti-Nazi pastoral letter written by the Dutch Catholic bishops.

While Saint Teresa Benedicta is the most famous member of this group, having been canonized by Pope John Paul II in 1998, all of them deserve the title of martyr, for they were killed not only because they were Jews but also because of the faith of the Church, which had compelled the Dutch bishops to protest the Nazi regime.

Through extensive research in both original and secondary sources, author Fr. Paul Hamans has compiled these martyrs' biographies, several of them detailed and accompanied by photographs. Fr. Hamans writes, "For the first time in the English language, a still incomplete list of Edith Stein's eighty-two travel companions to Auschwitz is published in the present work. The lives of twenty-eight of these murdered Catholic Jews are depicted by means of individual biographies. In the interest of historical authenticity the biographies were based, whenever possible, on accounts of those who saw and heard the events firsthand."

Included in this volume are some remarkable conversion stories, including that of Edith Stein, the German philosopher who had entered the Church in 1922 and later became a Carmelite nun, taking the name Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross.

Several of the witnesses chronicled here had already suffered for their faith in Christ before falling victim to Hitler's "Final Solution", enduring both rejection by their own people, including family members, and persecution by the so-called Christian society in which they lived.

Among these were those who, like Sister Teresa Benedicta, perceived the cross they were being asked to bear and accepted it willingly for the salvation of the world. Fr. Hamans explains, "Theirs was a fidelity that was sustained by a great spirit of sacrifice unto death. They saw their death as an act of expiation as well as a means of obtaining the conversion of the Jews, the good of the Church, and the restoration of peace."

The biography of Saint Teresa Benedicta shows not only her incredible conversion story, but also her willingness to suffer as a martyr. She writes, "Please allow me to offer myself to the Heart of Jesus as a sacrifice of propitiation for true peace... I know that I am nothing, but Jesus desires it, and surely He will call many others to do likewise in these days."

Roy Schoeman, author of "Salvation is From the Jews", says that this is "An important, beautiful, heart-wrenching book. Martyred for their Catholic faith, martyred for their Jewish blood. The faith, dedication to God, and love of the Church that they showed . . . are inspiring reminders of what the true stakes and rewards of our lives as Catholics are."

Ralph McInerny, former professor at the University of Notre Dame, writes in the Foreword of this book, "Father Hamans has put us in his debt for having taken on the enormous task of making the Jewish Catholic martyrs flesh and blood persons."

About the Author
Fr. Paul Hamans is a diocesan priest in Roermond, The Netherlands, where he teaches Church history at the seminary there. He has a doctorate in history from the University of Augsburg, Germany, and is an expert on the Dutch martyrs of the twentieth century. His other publications include "History of the Catholic Church in The Netherlands".

To request a review copy or an interview with author Fr. Paul Hamans, please contact:

Rose Trabbic, Publicist, Ignatius Press, (239)867-4180 or rose@ignatius.com