Mother Maria

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Mother Maria (Russian: Мать Мария) (1891 – 1945), born Elizaveta Yurievna Pilenko (Елизавета Юрьевна Пиленко), Kuzmina-Karavayeva (Кузьмина-Караваева) by her first marriage, Skobtsova (Скобцова) by her second marriage, was a Russian noble lady, poetess, nun, and member of the French Resistance movement during World War II.

In 1932 Elizaveta Pilenko made her monastic profession and became Mother Maria.^[1]

During the Nazi occupation of Paris, she worked to save Jewish refugees from deportation to the concentration camps, for which she was later recognized as one of the Righteous Among the Nations at Yad Vashem.^[2]

She died in the Ravensbrück concentration camp. Her life is dramatized in a Soviet movie starring Lyudmila Kasatkina. She was glorified by the Orthodox Church of Constantinople on January 16, 2004.

By the words of Metropolitan Anthony (Bloom) of Sourozh: "Mother Maria is a saint of our day and for our day; a woman of flesh and blood possessed by the love of God, who stood face to face with the problems of this century."^[3]

[edit] Example of poetry

In July, 1942, when the order requiring Jews to wear the yellow star was published, she wrote a poem entitled "Israel":

Two triangles, a star,

The shield of King David, our forefather.

This is election, not offense.

The great path and not an evil.

Once more in a term fulfilled,

Once more roars the trumpet of the end;

And the fate of a great people

Once more is by the prophet proclaimed.

Thou art persecuted again, O Israel,

But what can human malice mean to thee,

who have heard the thunder from Sinai?

^[1]

[edit] External links

• Web-site dedicated to Mother Maria, in Russian
• The Voice of Russia: Mother Maria
• Saint Mother Maria Skobtsova
• Elizaveta (Liza) Yurevna Pilenko

[edit] References

• OrthodoxWiki: Maria Skobtsova