Who is Blessed Franz Jägerstätter?
A Reflection by Fred Schaeffer, OFS
Franz Jägerstätter, TOSF (also spelled Jaegerstaetter in English; born Franz Huber, 20 May 1907 – 9 August 1943) was an Austrian farmer and conscientious objector during World War II. Jägerstätter was sentenced to death and executed for his refusal to fight for Nazi Germany. He is venerated as a martyr and has been beatified by the Catholic Church. Blessed Franz Jägerstätter was beatified by the Catholic Church in 2007 and is considered a martyr for his faith. His feast day is observed on May 21. He was a Secular Franciscan (TOSF).
Franz was born in Sankt Radegund, Archduchy of Austria above the Enns on 20 May 1907. He was 36 when he died. His mother was an unmarried chambermaid named Rosalia Huber who lived in Sankt Radegund, Upper Austria, a small village between Salzburg and Braunau am Inn where nearly everyone was Catholic. His father was Franz Bachmeier from Tarsdorf, the unmarried son of a farmer. He was born on 20 May 1907 in Huber's parents' home, and baptised in the parish church the next day under the name of St Francis Caracciolo. As his parents could not afford a marriage, Franz was first cared for by his grandmother, Elisabeth Huber, who had a reputation as an exceptionally devout woman. His biological father was killed in World War I in 1915, when Franz was seven or eight years old. In 1917, his mother married Heinrich Jägerstätter. As the marriage didn't result in children of Jägerstätter's own, he adopted his wife's son and gave over the farm to him after Franz married in 1936.
As a boy, Franz was a better than average student and an avid reader, apparently leaving school after his 14th birthday, as permitted by law. His fellow villagers remembered the Franz of early manhood fondly as "a jolly, robust, fun-loving, hot-blooded, 'he-man' type", intelligent and "bull-headed", who tended to be "ahead of the crowd" in his interests and to wish to be the first to try something new; he was the first in his village to own a motorcycle. While he regularly went to Mass, there was little to foreshadow the devotion he was known for in later years, and he once embarrassed the pastor of the village by asking him about the possibility that the Virgin Mary had other children after Jesus. In 1922, he participated in the local Passion play, acting as one of the soldiers who cast lots for the seamless robe of Christ.
The young Franz was also remembered as a good fighter. On one occasion, he spent several days in jail as a consequence of a fight with members of the Heimwehr provoked by the attention paid by members of the group to local girls. In August 1933, an illegitimate daughter, Hildegard, was born to Jägerstätter and a local farm maidservant, Theresia Auer. Although some friends expressed doubts about Jägerstätter's paternity of the girl, he voluntarily paid money for her support and visited her often. Perhaps due to circumstances related to the girl's conception, Jägerstätter apparently underwent an "exile" around this time during which he was obliged to leave Sankt Radegund for several years, working in the iron mines of Eisenerz. In the social democratic working class environment he first experienced a crisis of meaning, but returned to his homeland as a deeply pious person.
In the mid-1930s, Jägerstätter made a turn towards morality and piety that most of his neighbors recalled as "so sudden that people just couldn't understand it", "almost as if he had been possessed by a higher power", although others described it as more gradual. In 1934, Jägerstätter intended to enter a monastery, but the parish priest advised him against it.
On Maundy Thursday (9 April) of 1936, he married Franziska Schwaninger (4 March 1913 – 16 March 2013), a deeply religious woman. After the wedding liturgy, the couple went on a pilgrimage to Rome, where they received a blessing from Pope Pius XI. Most members of the community attributed Jägerstätter's conversion to his wife's influence or the sight of the pope, but other evidence indicates that his choice of a wife and decision to travel to Rome may have rather been influenced by a conversion that had already taken place; one friend recalled that he observed Jägerstätter had already become much more pious when he returned from the iron mines in late 1934 or 1935. The marriage resulted in three daughters: Rosalia (b. 1 September 1937), Maria (b. 4 September 1938), and Aloisia (b. 5 May 1940).
When German troops moved into Austria in March 1938, Jägerstätter rejected the offered position as Radegund mayor. He was the only person in the village to vote against the Anschluss in the plebiscite of 10 April; nevertheless, the local authorities suppressed his dissent and announced unanimous approval. He was dismayed to witness many Catholics in his town supporting the Nazis, writing, "I believe there could scarcely be a sadder hour for the true Christian faith in our country". Although he was not involved with any political organization and underwent a brief period of military training, he remained openly anti-Nazi. He avoided any contact with the NSDAP, nor did he seek the help of local representatives to avoid being drafted into the Wehrmacht.
The St. Radegund Parish Church, where Jägerstätter was a sacristan
On 8 December 1940, the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, he joined the Third Order of Saint Francis. In summer 1940, the local parish priest, Josef Karobath (1898-1983), offered him work as a sacristan, as Jägerstätter attended Mass daily anyway. He was therefore deferred from military service four times.
He was deported to Brandenburg-Görden Prison on 9 August 1943, where he was executed by guillotine that afternoon, at age 36. Minutes before his execution, he was given the option to sign a document to save his life and declined, abjuring any complicity with the Nazi regime. Jägerstätter's last recorded words before his death were, "I am completely bound in inner union with the Lord".
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Blessed Franz Jägerstätter
Third Order of Saint Francis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_J%C3%A4gerst%C3%A4tter#Arrest_and_death
(I've left the original links in this document, on purpose)
I’ve always had a curiosity about people killed in WWII, because part of my family on my mother’s side were killed in Concentration Camps during those awful years. In 1943, I was only three years old, in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. I recall parts of that time, because the armistice was in May 1945.
Let us pray for those, particularly Secular Franciscans and Religious, who were killed at that time.
Fred Schaeffer, OFS
May 21, 2025