Maximillian Kolbe was a Polish Franciscan friar. While training for the priesthood in Rome Maximillian founded the Crusade in 1917. The dark satanic forces of the First World War had gripped Europe. The tentacles of unbelief and ungodliness were strangling the spirit of faith in the human heart. Maximillian believed deep down that the world could be saved from destruction and sin by personal consecration to the Immaculate Virgin Mary.St Maximillian trusted deeply in the power of Mary to win souls for God and untie the shackles of sin that afflicted the world. Personal consecration was a weapon to pray for sinners and bring unbelievers back to God.
Charity and prayer were the weapons Maximillian used to advance the cause of the Crusade. He used the written word and printing to spread devotion to Mary. In 1941 he was imprisoned in Auschwitz concentration camp by the Nazis and offered his life for a fellow prisoner. At his canonization in 1982 he was recognised as a martyr of charity and an apostle for our difficult age.