From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   August 13th - Bl. Jakob Gapp   
      
   BL. JAKOB GAPP, the seventh child in the working class family of Martin Gapp   
   and Antonia Wach, was born on 26 July 1897 in Wattens, a small village in   
   the Austrian Tirol. On the following day he was baptized in the parish   
   church of St Laurence in Wattens.   
      
   After completing secondary school in his native village, he entered the   
   Franciscan high school in Hall, a Tirolean town, in 1910.   
      
   Jakob was called to military service in May 1915 and served on the Italian   
   front, where he was wounded in 1916. For this he received the silver medal   
   of Courage Second Class. On 4 November 1918 he was interned as a prisoner of   
   war in Riva del Garda and released on 18 August 1919.   
      
   Jakob entered the Marianist novitiate at Greisinghof, Upper Austria, where   
   he made his first vows in 1921. The young religious was assigned to the   
   Marian Institute in Graz, where he worked as a teacher and sacristan for   
   four years. At the same time he was preparing himself through private study   
   for the seminary. He made his profession of perpetual vows at Antony,   
   France, on 27 August 1925. In September 1925 Jakob entered the International   
   Marianist Seminary in Fribourg, Switzerland, and was ordained to the   
   priesthood by Bishop Marius Besson at St Nicholas Cathedral, Fribourg, on 5   
   April 1930.   
      
   Returning to Austria, he worked until 1938 as a teacher, director of   
   religious education, and chaplain in Marianist schools. During a time of   
   severe unemployment, Fr Gapp's great concern for the poor appeared in many   
   ways. He collected food and other necessities from his students, but also   
   refused to heat his own room in the winter to be able to give fuel to the   
   poor.   
      
   In this period, as National Socialism (Nazism) began to assert itself, first   
   in Germany and them in Austria, Fr Gapp formed a clear judgement about the   
   incompatibility of Nazism and the Christian faith by studying the German and   
   Austrian Bishops' statements and the Encyclical Mit brennender Sorge of Pope   
   Pius XI. In his teaching and preaching he continued this truth fearlessly.   
      
   When German troops arrived in Austria in March 1938, he was obliged to leave   
   Graz. After a few months at Freistadt his superiors sent him to his home   
   town in Tirol, since they saw in his anti-Nazi preaching a threat to the   
   very existence of those institutions whose elimination had already been   
   decided by the Nazis. In Tirol he enjoyed the last moment of peace in his   
   life. He had been an assistant pastor in Breitenwang-Reutte for only two   
   months when the Gestapo, at the end of October 1938, forbade him to teach   
   religion. Fr Gapp had taught the uncompromising law of love for all men and   
   women without reference to nationality or religion.   
      
   In a sermon on 11 December 1938 he defended Pope Pius XI against the attacks   
   of the Nazis, and directed the faithful of the parish to read Catholic   
   literature rather than Nazi propaganda. After this sermon Jakob Gapp was   
   advised to leave the country.   
      
   With the help of his religious superiors Fr Gapp escaped to Bordeaux,   
   France, where he worked at the cradle of the Society of Mary as a chaplain   
   and librarian. In May 1939 he went to Spain, where he served in the   
   Marianist communities at San Sebastian, Cadiz and Valencia. In Spain he   
   stood alone and misunderstood because of his rejection of Nazism.   
      
   The Gestapo, having followed him since he left Austria, took advantage of   
   his loneliness. Two individuals pretending to be Jews from Berlin told Fr   
   Gapp about their fictitious experience of flight from Nazi persecution. In   
   Valencia they asked him to instruct them in the Catholic faith. After   
   gaining his confidence, they invited him on a trip, and then abducted him   
   across the border into German-occupied France.   
      
   Fr Jakob Gapp was arrested on 9 November 1942 in Hendaye, France, and   
   brought to Berlin. On 2 July 1943, the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus,   
   he was condemned to death. Any pardon and the transfer of his remains to his   
   relatives for simple burial were denied because Fr Gapp had "defended his   
   conduct on expressly religious grounds. For an explicitly religious people   
   Fr Gapp would be considered a martyr for the faith, and his burial could be   
   used by the Catholic population as an opportunity for a silent demonstration   
   in support of an already judged traitor of his people who was pretending to   
   die for his faith".   
      
   At 1:00 p.m. on 13 August 1943, Jakob Gapp was informed that his execution   
   would take place at 7:00 p.m. The two farewell letters he wrote after this   
   announcement are truly moving expressions of his faith. At 7:08 p.m. Fr Gapp   
   was guillotined in the Plotzensee Prison, Berlin. His remains were sent for   
   research to the Anatomical-Biological Institute of the University of Berlin.   
      
      
   Saint Quote   
   Let nothing trouble you, let nothing make you afraid. All things pass away.   
   God never changes. Patience obtains everything. God alone is enough.   
   -Saint Teresa of Avila   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   You shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice; and you shall be   
   sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. St. John 16:20   
      
      
   <><><><>   
   The following is a hymn-prayer from the Precious Blood Manual of the   
   Sisters of the Precious Blood:   
      
   O Sacred Heart of Jesus   
   I place my trust in Thee   
   Whatever may befall me, Lord,   
   Though dark the hour may be.   
      
   In all my joys, in all my woes,   
   Though no such thing but grief I see,   
   O Sacred Heart of Jesus,   
   I place my trust in Thee.   
      
   When those I love have passed away   
   And I am achingly distressed,   
   O Sacred heart of Jesus,   
   I fly to Thee for rest.   
      
   In all my trials great or small,   
   My confidence shall be   
   Unshaken as I cry, dear Lord,   
   "I place my trust in Thee."   
      
   This is my one sweet prayer, O Lord!   
   My faith, my trust, my love   
   But most of all, in that last hour   
   When death incline to Thee above.   
      
   Ah, then, sweet Saviour, may Thy face   
   Smile on my soul set free.   
   Oh, may I cry with rapturous love,   
   "I've placed my trust in Thee."   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)