Karl Leisner (February 28, 1915–August 12, 1945) was a Roman Catholic priest interred in the Dachau concentration camp. He died as a result of his mistreatment in the camp after being liberated by the Allied forces. He has been declared a martyr and was beatified by Pope John Paul II on June 23, 1996.

Life

Karl Leisner was born in Rees and moved with his family to Kleve when he was six years old. He attended school and completed his college-preparatory school in 1934. He studied theology in Münster, where he founded illegal youth groups to resist the Nazis. With these groups he travelled to the Benelux countries to have camps outside of Nazi control. He was also named official diocesan youth leader by Clemens August Cardinal Galen in the same year. When forced to become a worker under the Third Reich, he organized Masses for himself and the other workers. His home and papers were searched by the Gestapo.

On March 25, 1939, Cardinal Galen ordained him deacon. Due to his criticism of Adolf Hitler, he was arrested on November 9, 1939, by the Gestapo while on a vacation in St. Blasien for his health. He was imprisoned in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp initially, but was moved to Dachau on December 14, 1941. (Most Catholic prisoners were kept in that camp.) On December 17, 1944, a fellow prisoner, French Bishop Gabriel Piquet , ordained him a priest. At the time, Leisner was already suffering from the tuberculosis that would later claim his life. The newly ordained priest only celebrated a single Mass. When Dachau was liberated on May 4, 1945, Leisner was taken to the tuberculosis hospital in Planegg near Munich. He died there a few months later, on August 12, 1945.

Beatification

On a visit to Berlin in 1996, Pope John Paul II recognized Leisner as a martyr for the Catholic faith and beatified him, together with Bernhard Lichtenberg, another Nazi resister. His feast day is August 12.

His canonization process has not yet been completed. The postulator can be reached at Karl-Leisner-Kreis e.V. Kleve, Leitgraben 26, 47533 Kleve-Kellen, Germany.

Reference

• Haas, Wilhelm. Christus meine Leidenschaft. Karl Leisner. Sein Leben in Bildern und Dokumenten. 3rd edition. Kevelaer, Butzon und Bercker, 1985. ISBN 3766694251

External links

• Home page of the Karl Leisner Kreis (in German)