Maria Skobtsova was born Elizaveta Pilenko on December 20, 1891 in Riga, Latvia, then part of the Russian Empire.
Elizaveta's marriage to her first husband the Bolshevik Dmitriy Kuz'min-Karavaev ended after three years in 1913.
She was first drawn to Christianity in the 1910s by the humanity of Jesus. She testified: "He also died. He sweated blood. They struck his face".
Angry at Leon Trotsky for closing the Socialist-Revolutionary Party Congress, Elizaveta planned to kill him, but her colleagues stepped in and sent her to Anapa, a town on the northern coast of the Black Sea.
When the anti-communist White Army took control of Anapa, Elizaveta was put on trial for being a Bolshevik. However, the judge, Daniel Skobtsov, was a former teacher of hers and she was acquitted.
Elizaveta and Daniel fell in love and got married. However, in order to avoid danger as a result of the turmoil following the Russian Revolution, they were forced to flee the country. After travelling first to Georgia and then to Yugoslavia, they finally arrived in Paris in 1923.
By the late 1920s, Daniel and Elizaveta's marriage was falling apart. Her bishop encouraged her to take vows as a nun and in 1932, with Daniel Skobtov's permission, an ecclesiastical divorce was granted and she took monastic vows taking the name Maria.
From then on, Mother Maria devoted her life to the poor. She opened up a rented house in Paris to refugees, the needy and the lonely. The Convent also soon became a center for intellectual and theological discussion.
After the fall of Paris to the German Nazis in 1940, Mother Maria felt that it was her particular duty to render all possible assistance to persecuted Jews and her convent became a haven for persecuted Jewish women and children. Money poured in to help them to flee from France and hundreds escaped. However the courageous nun realized that her brave work would result in almost certain imprisonment and probable death. Eventually an informer told the Nazis about her, the convent was closed down and Mother Maria was arrested.
Mother Maria was sent to the terrible Ravensbruck concentration camp, where Jewish prisoners who were no longer able to work were sent to die. There was a rule that those unable to stand during roll call would be sent to the gas chambers. On Good Friday 1945 about 30 prisoners from the women's quarters were lined up outside the buildings for roll call including Mother Maria Skobtsova. The brave nun collapsed, and the following day on March 31, 1945 she passed through the doors of the gas chambers never to be seen again.
Mother Maria was canonized a saint by act of the Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate on January 16, 2004.
Elizaveta's marriage to her first husband the Bolshevik Dmitriy Kuz'min-Karavaev ended after three years in 1913.
She was first drawn to Christianity in the 1910s by the humanity of Jesus. She testified: "He also died. He sweated blood. They struck his face".
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| Maria Skobtsova |
Angry at Leon Trotsky for closing the Socialist-Revolutionary Party Congress, Elizaveta planned to kill him, but her colleagues stepped in and sent her to Anapa, a town on the northern coast of the Black Sea.
When the anti-communist White Army took control of Anapa, Elizaveta was put on trial for being a Bolshevik. However, the judge, Daniel Skobtsov, was a former teacher of hers and she was acquitted.
Elizaveta and Daniel fell in love and got married. However, in order to avoid danger as a result of the turmoil following the Russian Revolution, they were forced to flee the country. After travelling first to Georgia and then to Yugoslavia, they finally arrived in Paris in 1923.
By the late 1920s, Daniel and Elizaveta's marriage was falling apart. Her bishop encouraged her to take vows as a nun and in 1932, with Daniel Skobtov's permission, an ecclesiastical divorce was granted and she took monastic vows taking the name Maria.
From then on, Mother Maria devoted her life to the poor. She opened up a rented house in Paris to refugees, the needy and the lonely. The Convent also soon became a center for intellectual and theological discussion.
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| Mother Maria of Paris |
After the fall of Paris to the German Nazis in 1940, Mother Maria felt that it was her particular duty to render all possible assistance to persecuted Jews and her convent became a haven for persecuted Jewish women and children. Money poured in to help them to flee from France and hundreds escaped. However the courageous nun realized that her brave work would result in almost certain imprisonment and probable death. Eventually an informer told the Nazis about her, the convent was closed down and Mother Maria was arrested.
Mother Maria was sent to the terrible Ravensbruck concentration camp, where Jewish prisoners who were no longer able to work were sent to die. There was a rule that those unable to stand during roll call would be sent to the gas chambers. On Good Friday 1945 about 30 prisoners from the women's quarters were lined up outside the buildings for roll call including Mother Maria Skobtsova. The brave nun collapsed, and the following day on March 31, 1945 she passed through the doors of the gas chambers never to be seen again.
Mother Maria was canonized a saint by act of the Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate on January 16, 2004.
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