Seeking dialogue

Throughout his life, Fr Titus Brandsma was a man of forgiveness and reconciliation, including in the most complicated situations and contexts. When he was Assistant Press Officer of the Catholic Press, he had to face complex situations (political instability, tension, labor struggles, radicalization, etc.) and always demonstrated a willingness for dialogue, open to the ears of all. Through this, he earned the nickname “the reconciler.”
Similarly, during the year he held the position of Chancellor of the Catholic University of Nijmegen, Professor Brandsma tried to create an atmosphere of dialogue and always sought to find opportunities for encounter and understanding. It was not easy, since the Central European universities at the beginning of the 1930s found themselves in an atmosphere of extreme tension between radicalisms of various types (communists, fascists, nationalists, etc.).
Given this context, perhaps we can understand better his fondness for Esperanto, the artificial language created by Ludwig Zamenhof to avoid so much division (including violence) provoked by the not always easy coexistence of languages, and to fend off the linguistic colonialism that, in no few occasions, imposes itself.
Esperanto was for him – maybe in a somewhat romantic way – an instrument of understanding, a way of overcoming the linguistic barriers that, on occasion, turn into racial, supremacist, and discriminatory barriers.

Ecumenism

At the same time, from this point of view, the ecumenical attiude of Titus is understood in all its depth. Our Carmelite was a true pioneer of ecumenism in Carmel. He formed, with great enthusiasm, the so-called “Apostolate of Reunification”, oriented to the better knowledge and rapprochement of Catholics with the eastern churches. In addition, he always showed a very respectful attitude and was close to the Protestants (mostly in the Netherlands) and always pursued frank and fraternal dialogue with the separated brothers.

In the face of conflict

During the long months of imprisonment in various prisons and concentration camps, Fr Titus lived together with several Protestants, some of whom would later testify during the beatification process, emphasizing his generosity, kindness and deep trust in the Lord.

This does not mean to say that he was a “diplomat,” nor that he lacked strong ethical and religious principles; on the contrary. Indeed, after the Dutch invasion, on a few occasions, Professor Brandsma would show his firm opposition to some of the occupational government’s measures, including on the subject of education (when he refused to comply with the obligatory order expel to Jewish children) as on the theme of the press (when he told the directors of Catholic newspapers that they must refuse to publish Nazi slogans). However, despite his firm rejection of National Socialist ideology, he never showed any hatred toward the guards of the Lager for what they did to him. Moreover, our Carmelite invited the religious whom he met in Dachau to pray for them.
Deep down, he believed that yielding to hatred would be the true victory of evil.
Fr Titus never hated the Germans either as a people, as a nation. When the sergeant-at-law Hardegen asked him to write a small essay about the reasons why the Dutch, and especially Catholics, opposed National Socialism, the prisoner developed a brief composition in which he elaborated on the philosophical, ethical and religious motives (a theme about which he had spoken frequently in his university classes). Despite the head-on opposition, the text concluded with a beautiful blessing: God bless the Netherlands! God bless Germany! May God grant these two peoples to return to the path of peace and freedom, and to recognize His Glory for the good of these two nations that are so close.

Today

In a world like ours, full of divisions and conflicts, Fr Titus appears before our eyes as an example, as a witness that reconciliation and forgiveness are possible, despite the difficulties, and as a true martyr for those most authentic Christian values.

Prayer

We ask you, Lord,

that by the example and intervention of Saint Titus Brandsma,

who endured the torments of martyrdom with joy and full confidence in Your Divine Will,

we too, Carmelites of the 21st Century – friars, contemplative nuns, religious of the active life,

Third Order members, lay people of various groups – may always testify to the radicality of Christian love

and the values of the Gospel, and that our lives may be seeds of reconciliation and forgiveness.

Amen.

Mary, Mother of Carmel, pray for us.

Titus Brandsma, Carmelite martyr, intercede for us.

Download the Leaflet 4. Witness of Forgiveness pdf here (3.13 MB)

Early Life

Anno Brandsma was born to Tjitsje and Titus Brandsma on February 23rd 1881 at Wonseradeel in Friesland, a province in the very north of Holland. The Brandsma family consisted of four girls and two boys, of which Titus was the second youngest. Five of the siblings would later enter religious life.
The family owned a dairy farm and herd, selling milk and cheese made on the farm itself. At the time, Catholics were a minority in Friesland and protective of their religion and culture. Anno’s father worked to preserve the Friesian culture within his family and the local community. He participated in politics, and at one time served as chairman of the local election board.
When Anno had completed his secondary education at a Franciscan school, he decided to join the Carmelite Order. He began his novitiate at Boxmeer in September 1898 taking his father’s name, Titus, as his religious name. He made his First Profession in October 1899 and was ordained priest on June 17th 1905.
After further studies at the Gregorian University in Rome, he was awarded a PhD in Philosophy in 1909.
Titus also had a keen interest in both Spirituality and Journalism, two areas which, together with his academic pursuits, would make up much of his life’s work.

Ministry and Mission

In 1923, Titus helped found the Catholic University of Nijmegen, and worked there as lecturer, professor and administrator. He served as Rector Magnificus (President) during the academic year 1932-33.
As a Carmelite friar, he also liked to share the Order’s spiritual tradition with people outside of the University.
He travelled widely lecturing on Carmelite Spirituality. In preparation for a lecture tour in the United States in 1935, he spent some time at the Carmelite Priories in Whitefriar Street, Dublin, and Kinsale, Co. Cork, Ireland.

Journalism

Titus also cultivated his interest in journalism and publishing. In late 1935 he became the National Spiritual Adviser to the Union of Catholic Journalists. In this role, he encouraged opposition to the publication of Nazi propaganda in Catholic newspapers and in the Press generally. He was especially critical of its anti-Semitism.
When the Nazis invaded Holland in May 1940, Titus was an adviser to the Archbishop of Utrecht. He encouraged the bishops to speak out against the persecution of the Jews and the infringement of human rights generally by the occupiers. In doing so, he became a marked man by the authorities.

Arrest and Martyrdom

The refusal by Catholic newspapers to print Nazi propaganda sealed the fate of Titus. Titus had agreed to deliver personally to each editor a letter from the Catholic bishops. This letter instructed the editors not to comply with a new law requiring them to print official Nazi advertisements and articles. Titus had visited fourteen editors before being arrested by the Gestapo at Nijmegen on January 19th 1942.
Titus was interned at Scheveningen and Amersfoort in Holland before being transported to Dachau in June.
Under the harsh regime there, his health quickly deteriorated and he was in the camp hospital by the third week of July. He was subjected to biological experimentation before being killed by lethal injection on July 26th, 1942. On the day he died, the Dutch Bishops issued a pastoral letter protesting strongly against the deportation of Jews from Holland.
Before his execution, Titus had prayed that God might help the nurse who would administer the injection to repent of her actions in the camp. He also gave her his rosary beads, although she protested that she was a lapsed Catholic. Some years later, that same woman came to a Carmelite priory seeking forgiveness and was a witness in the process for his beatification, which took place in Rome on November 3rd 1985.

Prayer Before an Image of Christ

O Jesus, when I gaze on You

Once more alive, that I love You

And that your heart loves me too

Moreover as your special friend.

Although that calls me to suffer more

Oh, for me all suffering is good,

For in this way I resemble You

And this is the way to Your Kingdom.

I am blissful in my suffering

For I know it no more as sorrow

But the most ultimate elected lot

That unites me with You, o God.

O, just leave me here silently alone,

The chill and cold around me

And let no people be with me

Here alone I grow not weary.

For Thou, O Jesus, art with me

I have never been so close to You.
Stay with me, with

me, Jesus sweet,

Your presence makes all things good for

me.

Written by Titus Brandsma on February 12th-13th 1942, while a prisoner at Scheveningen.

Translation: Susan Verkerk-Wheatley / Anne-Marie Bos

© Titus Brandsma Instituut 2018

Download the Leaflet 1. A Brief Biography  pdf here (4.05 MB)

Lessons from Brandsma’s Life:

• Opening lines of the poem he composed in his prison cell at Scheveningen explains the source of his inner strength: O Jesus, when I see you, I know again that I love you and that also your heart loves me ...

• The experience of those with him at Dachau was that Brandsma’s serene inner peace came from a deep source: Your nearness makes all things well within me – enabling him to be so serene in the midst of so much activity and so many concerns.

• Brandsma taught that our orientation towards God comes from within ourselves: The indwelling and inworking of God must not only be the object of intuition but also manifest themselves in our life, come to expression in our words and deeds, and radiate from our whole being and behavior.

• In his 1932 Foundation Day Rector’s speech at the University of Nijmegen, Brandsma said: The idea of God is not immutable like rock but manifests itself in our lives in ever-shifting images which do not mean an essential change but place our idea of God in a different light. Titus calls for great openness to this variability of the idea of God. We must seek the Eternal One in time.

• God is the deepest ground of our being

… a person notices that he/she is being moved and shaped by forces that come from the core of his/her being;

… to open oneself up to the inner world is to experience it as mystery.  It is not from oneself … it is given to us.

God’s life in us is dynamic – continually coming to power in us:  God is an inner power who impacts us in a liberating and clarifying way and causes us to look at the world differently.

This sense of God in/with him enabled Brandsma to be at home anywhere, whether in the midst of people or in the silence of his cell.

• Brandsma taught that God works in humans in such a hidden way that all that is human remains and is not destroyed and that in the inner life of every human being there are moments of waiting and receiving – alongside a time for decision, action and self-giving.

• Real life is shaped and led by what we can understand and is rational but also by the accidental.

• Brandsma taught: Kneel before the image of God in your brother.

  • Brandsma’s respect for people arises from the fact that they are connected with each other in and through God. This respect for others induces a person to give his/her fellow humans the space in which they can be themselves.

• On June 16 1942, Brandsma was dispatched to Dachau, where he was stripped of all dignity, known only as number 30492.

  • He conducted himself as if he lived in freedom. His inner silence was something no one could take from him.

  • Terrible indignities suffered at Dachau. From this time on, Titus died continually: he let go of what he expected from this human existence, and abandoned himself to what became possible in the eyes of God. His deepest base was the certainty of his being beloved … O Jesus, when I look on you My love for you becomes more true. And yours, I know, will never end: You see me as a special friend.

  • Raphael repeatedly mentions the serenity and balance which Brandsma displayed.

  • Brandsma remained totally serene … he displayed the mystic’s spirit of “disinterestedness”.

  • “The man who beat and kicked him could not touch his interior life”.

  • “The Capuchin priest Othmarus comments: An eternal smile full of patience and inner serenity, a smile of mystical resignation in the all suffering he had to bear, marked Titus. He had been maltreated so badly that his teeth literally hung loose in his mouth. He repaid all that with the prayer of Christ:  ‘Father, forgive them’. Neither I nor anyone else ever heard him complain. He was a saint.

• “In Scheveningen and Amersfoort he lived and spoke from the riches of his knowledge and experience, as that became evident from his interrogation, his defence, his speech about Geert Grote. In Kleve and Dachau he realized that he had been abandoned by the authorities. This realization shocked him deeply. After a severe inner conflict he surrendered. He no longer expected a rescue. The only thing that was strongly alive in him was the realization that he was in God’s hands and that his dignity was ‘inviolable’”.

• His reflection in Scheveningen, I know that You love me, sustained him.

• On 26 July 1942, Brandsma was administered a fatal injection and died.

Titus Brandsma’s Spiritual Journey: 

• From Brandsma, others learn to entrust themselves to God in circumstances they do not understand but which shape their spiritual journey.

• His upbringing was stable; this was the way of life he experienced both in his family and in the Church; stability was a focus and ideal.

• After minor seminary, Brandsma opted for the Carmelites, having developed a strong interest in Carmelite spirituality. He was powerfully drawn to the mystical side of life in the monastery at Boxmeer, where he undertook his initial formation. He was struck by the sign “Silentium perpetuum,” which he regarded as a personal invitation into a process.

• “He described his cell in detail; he is obviously at home in it. It is his inner world. He will be at home everywhere. “My cell” can be understood as the key phrase for Titus’ experience of God’s nearness. In the final phase of his life it returns – in a poem which became widely known in the post-war years. In his first letter he wrote about his cell and his fellow brothers; in his last writings what is left is only his cell; but again he writes that his is happy there. His cell is his mighty fortress, the ever-living wellspring of life. There he became familiar with God’s nearness.”

• As a student, Brandsma began publishing, his first work being a translation of select works of Teresa of Avila.

In Teresa, he recognized something of himself. She could be restlessly at work without losing herself. Instead of feeling overwhelmed by the challenges she faced, she decided to do whatever she was capable of.

• Brandma’s motto: Take the days as they come. It indicates his being in touch with reality, but wanting to do things that are important. His realism creates balance in his life.

• During difficult times in his studies, he immersed himself in the experiences of mystical writers with which he could identify. He turned his gaze inwards: he was in “his cell.”

• Activity alternated with silence throughout his life.

• He understood Carmelite life as having a two-fold goal:

1. 1. “To meet our obligations”

   2. “Already in this life to some extent taste in our heart and experience in our spirit the gracious impact of the divine presence and the sweetness of the heavenly glory”.

• Brandsma’s life coincided with a period of restoration of the Church in Holland. There was a focus on externals and a wariness of the mystical dimension of faith. Titus, however, believed that this was the foundation of the true recovery of the Church and it motivated him, no matter how busy he was.

• He was very involved in the advancement of Frisian culture and the development of the Frisian people. However, the renewal of the spiritual life of Dutch Catholics was his primary objective. He believed/demonstrated that persons touched by an abundance of grace will also be caught up in an abundance of activity in their life.

• Brandsma was an eclectic philosopher, but the mystical life was his strong suit. He immersed himself in the experiences of the mystical authors. He was conscious of the inexhaustible mystery of life’s connectedness (past and present). His central idea was that God is inexpressibly near to us in this world: To believe in God is to live in God.

• The theme of “balance” or “equilibrium” frequently surfaces in his writing.

• His teaching that the mystical person continually lets go of him/herself was Brandsma’s secret for being able to do so many things.

• When Brandsma spoke of mysticism, Godfried Bomans, a student of Brandsma’s at Nijmegen, “infallibly sensed that Titus’ words did not proceed from academic theories but had to do with his own experiences”.

• In spiritual talks, Brandsma used the image of the “enclosed garden,” a metaphor for the ideal world (paradise) at the beginning of creation. He wrote: We must turn our heart into a garden and we must make our hearts into a Carmel.

• The God about whom Brandsma speaks is a God who wants to be near, uniquely present to people. This same idea is present in Teresa of Avila’s poem:

 And if, by chance, you do not know

where you will find Me,

do not wander to and fro,

for if you want to find Me,

you must find Me in you.

Because you are My dwelling place,

you are My house and home,

and so I call out at any time,

whenever in your thoughts

I find the door closed.

• Brandsma’s refusal to place ads in the Catholic papers as directed by the government in 1941 led to his arrest and detention. He entered a cell in which the hours no longer held sway over the person, where there is a timeless silence and where God’s world totally enveloped him … a mystic’s view.

• Brandsma detached himself inwardly from the grip the Nazis had on him – and turned a disadvantage into an advantage … I am happy in my cell - “A cell becomes sweeter to the degree it is more faithfully inhabited” (Thomas á Kempis, Imitation of Christ)

• The way in which Brandsma reacted to his imprisonment is characteristic of people with a strong will to live. He did not allow himself to be overpowered by the space in which he was confined.

• Like Teresa of Avila (writing about the castle of the soul), Brandsma – both in his 1^st letter home after entering the monastery as a boy and in writing about his prison cell, writes about the room at the center of the building.

• Brandsma could be “in his cell” everywhere. To “stay in one’s cell” means to seek out the silence, to be by yourself.

• Brandsma lived in his own inner world – not a separate world – but in the world in which he lived.

• “In the greatest desolation, Titus Brandsma could be happy” – he had joy from within.

• Brandsma drew on Carmelite spirituality – a bridge between Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, drawing on the inspiration of Elijah. Its deepest ground is the search for the living God.

• In prison in Scheveningen, Brandsma was realistic about the consequences of his statements and actions; the poem he wrote there expresses his acceptance of the consequences of his behavior:

  • This poem is a form of dialogue, expressing powerlessness and emptiness on the one hand and a deep desire to somehow reach the ears of God who is silent.

  • Brandsma felt himself being absorbed into the sacred.

  • It follows a previous time of emptiness and dread.

  • His call now is to a place of quiet encounter.

  • He returned to himself and to Him who sustained his life: he experiences peace and being loved by God.

  • He is opening to God as one renouncing one’s self-centredness.

  • He expresses an “I – Thou” relationship with God: wonder, emotion, fear, gratitude.

  • His use of “friend” indicates intimacy.

  • He reveals an eye for the person behind every façade.

  • He reveals a challenge for which he draws strength in his inner life.

  • He shows resignation in a time of suffering and disaster.

  • He demonstrates the Mystics belief that suffering has a positive meaning … one becomes transformed in God – a source of power and hope.

  • He is freed from attachment to self-preservation; he worked for the liberation of people.

  • Amid all the violence, he encounters the love of God … his life is rooted in God, not himself.

• Brandsma inhabits the mystical space of solitude in which one experiences freedom

  • Silence and solitude took him into the space of his own heart;

  • Within the clear, plain walls, in the intimate light of his cell, he finds the inner silence and refined attention which makes him sensitive to the friendly presence of God;

  • He is always, wherever he is, in the inner silence of his cell.

• Increasingly, Brandsma became the Carmelite that the Carmelite Rule envisages.

  • A contemplative encounter with God: God is near.

• Brandsma retained a sense of humor in his predicament: the fact that in my old age I ended up in a jail cell, tended more to make me laugh than that the tragedy of it could depress me …

• Brandsma witnessed that we see God when we allow ourselves to be transformed in his infinite silence.

  • Over many years, Brandsma had practised silence as a way of life.

  • His favourite text from Teresa of Avila: Let nothing disturb you; let nothing alarm you. All things pass, only God never changes. Patience conquers all. Those who hold onto God lack nothing.

• Throughout a month and a half in Sheveningen he wrote seven chapters of a biography on Teresa of Avila for which he had been commissioned. He wrote this text in the margins of another book he had because he had no other writing materials.

• Brandsma experienced a personally testing time at Amersfoort, as expressed in the poem:

Grief would come and lay me low,

No chance to make it go away,

Nor with any tears allay,

Else had I done it long ago.

Then it came and on me weighed,

Till I lay still and no more wept,

Learned to watch and patience kept;

Thereafter it no longer stayed.

All that is passed and set aside’ from far away I still recall

And cannot understand at all

That ancient grief nor why I cried.

• “What comes across in this poem is not the language of power. It is the language of a person who has been sidelined, who is no longer a factor to be reckoned with, but who has nevertheless positioned himself in reality in a way that is entirely his own, which, consequently, is still there. He has his memories of past years, memories of a well-ordered life of praying and working, and the security he found there. Now he has found a new security which no one can take from him because they themselves do not know this security”.

• Brandsma achieved an inner security in which he knew his cries of anguish were being heard; a security embedded in the all-embracing presence of God, a security found in waiting and being patient.

• “A person who has thus experienced this acceptance as a favor and himself as altogether open and desirous of this favour can say of himself that he is happy in his cell”.

• “We do not belong to ourselves – both our origin and our destiny is given to us”.

• On May 16 1942, Brandsma arrived in Kleve, a transit station on the way to Dachau.

  • In this prison, fear destroyed his inner peace; his cell was no longer a place in which he could be alone and find rest. God seemed far away and silent.

  • Brandsma had to go through a “dark night” of solitude and helplessness:

    • No other comfort than inner capacity for listening (cf. John of the Cross: O guiding night! O night more lovely than the dawn.

  • Brandsma reached a point of “relinquishment” (leaving events to themselves), meaning he had to relinquish himself. “Those who relinquish themselves to God find themselves again as they have never been before, but do not recognize themselves. They find the most essential nature of their existence that lies deeply concealed in the unknown depths of their life”.

  • He adjusts to “take the days as they come”: in a new and purified way, this gave him rest.

  • For Titus, “relinquishment” meant surrendering everything to him who is greater than we and will not drop us.

  • At the end of his life, Titus relinquished the desire to be at home in his cell. He was at home nowhere. In this respect he was walking in the footsteps of the first Carmelites who relinquished Mount Carmel, not knowing where that might lead.