Karl Leisner
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Karl Leisner (28 February 1915 in
Life
Leisner was born on 28 February 1915, the oldest of five children. When he was six years old, the family moved to
In 1934, when he was nineteen, Leisner entered the seminary in
On 25 March 1939, Galen ordained Leisner a
Prisoners often had to work outside in snow or rain and then had to sleep in their wet prison clothes. Cold weather, poor rations and harsh treatment proved a dangerous combination for someone already suffering to tuberculosis. Such conditions caused Leisner's condition to become active. Then, during an inspection, two Gestapo guards beat him unconscious and he spent several hours on the floor of his hut. By March 1942, he was spitting blood and was forced to report to the infirmary where medical experiments were known to be performed. He was put in a room that was crowded with over 100 tuberculosis patients. In Dachau, there was never any attempt to cure a disease and very little care was given to the sick. During inspections of the infirmary, any patient thought to be incurable was executed.[1]
On 17 December 1944,
The newly ordained priest only celebrated a single Mass and was so ill that he had to postpone his first Mass for over a week.[3] When Dachau was liberated on 4 May 1945, Leisner was taken to a sanatarium in Planegg, near Munich. He died there a few months later, on 12 August 1945.
Leisner's body was taken to Kleve and buried in a local cemetery on 20 August 1945. His remains were exhumed and re-interred in the crypt of the Cathedral of Xanten in 1966.
Beatification
On a visit to
The canonization process for Leisner has not yet been completed.
Media
Some works have been published in English about Leisner. One is The Victory of Father Karl by Otto Pies, published in 1957. It was a translation of Stephanus heute; Karl Leisner, Priester und Opfer. A radio drama adaptation was produced for "The Hour of St. Francis" with the same title. A half-hour docudrama on videotape was released by the Daughters of St. Paul in 1984, also with the same title.
Leisner and Schoenstatt
Karl Leisner got to know the
See also
References
- ^ a b c "Blessed Karl Leisner", Heroes of the Holocaust, Catholic Heritage Curricula
- ^ a b c Phillips, Francis. "The incredible story of the priest ordained amidst the horrors of Dachau", Catholic Herald, 17 July 2017
- ^ a b c ""Biographies of the Blesseds", L'Osservatore Romano, 1996". Archived from the original on 30 June 2017. Retrieved 7 February 2013.
Sources
- Hermann GEBERT, Geschichte einer Berufung. Karl Leisner (1915-1945). Vallendar, Patris Verlag, 2001.
- Arnaud Join-Lambert, Karl Leisner. Bruyères-le-Chatel : Nouvelle Cité, 2009 (collection Prier 15 jours avec, n° 132) 128 p. ISBN 978-3-87620-342-3.
- René Lejeune, Comme l'or passé au feu. Carl Leisner 1915-1945. Éditions du Parvis, Hauteville / Suisse, 1989, 285 p.
- Hans-Karl SEEGER, Karl Leisners letztes Tagebuch. In Handschrift, in Druckschrift und kommentiert. "Segne auch, Höchster, meine Feinde !". Dialogverlag, Münster, 2000.
- Pies, Otto, The Victory of Father Karl. New York: Farrar, Straus and Cudahy, 1957. Translation of Stephanus heute; Karl Leisner, Priester und Opfer.
External links
- Home page of the Karl Leisner Kreis Archived 3 November 2014 at the Wayback Machine (in German)