It was this singular conviction, buoyed by a clarity of conscience, that gave Franz Jagerstatter the courage to refuse participation in the evil of Hitler’s depraved ideology and military conquests, even at the cost of losing his own life. 

But the path to a life marked by sacrifice seemed initially as unremarkable as any farmer’s upbringing in the Austrian village of St Radegund. Jagerstatter was born in 1907 to an unmarried farm servant, educated in a one room schoolhouse, as pious as the next churchgoing villager in an area steeped in Catholicism, but also prone to fistfights and other mischief.

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His deepening faith as a young man could in part be attributed to Franziska Schwaninger, the devout woman he married, though there were already signs of greater dedication to the affairs of the Church. Together, they had three daughters and lived a happy but ordinary life, attending to their family and farm. But they also increasingly incorporated regular Mass attendance, the Rosary and other prayerful devotions into the rhythms of their daily life, along with significant involvement in their local parish. It was a time of fruitful spiritual growth for the couple.

In 1938, Austria officially joined the Third Reich, with the support, at least outwardly, of the Catholic hierarchy. Jagerstatter went away in 1940, as most men did, for a stint of military training, aware of the cruel and unyielding goals of the growing Nazi movement. While the hateful, anti-Christian agenda was apparent to the Jagerstatters, there was little opposition voiced by the local bishops or priests. 

His letters home during military training - and later from prison after being arrested in 1943 for his refusal to serve - showed a deep bond of love with his wife and children.  They also revealed Jagerstatter’s absolute conviction that to serve in the Nazi regime would be antithetical to his faith and cause him to fall into a state of sin.  He was unwilling to jeopardize the hope of eternal life with his heavenly Father, even for the joys of earthly happiness with his family.

In many ways, Jagerstatter was alone.  Apart from learning of a Catholic priest, Fr. Franz Reinisch, who had been held in the same prison and executed for holding similar convictions, most of his spiritual mentors, and even his wife, begged him to reconsider his position.  His wife ultimately supported him, a testament to her own deep faith.

 But during his months in prison, three of them in solitary confinement, Jagerstatter knew he was not alone. Aware of the pain his family would experience, he nonetheless trusted in God’s faithfulness to care for his soul and the family he would leave behind.

In his last letter home, Jagerstatter wrote, “I thank our Savior I could suffer for Him and may die for him…I trust in His infinite mercy.  I trust that God forgives me everything and will not abandon me in the last hour.” The priest who accompanied him to his execution later recounted that Jagerstatter faced his execution at peace, and believed Jagerstatter to be the one true saint whom he had ever met.  

Jagerstatter traded the earthly for the eternal, drawing from a deep well of abiding trust in the steadfastness of God’s infinite mercy, and inspiring Christians decades later to draw closer to Him who offers the same gift to us.

For further study:  Jagerstatter’s witness to faith may have remained largely unknown if not for author Gordon Zahn, who brought the story into public consciousness with his 1964 book, “In Solitary Witness.” It subsequently influenced The Second Vatican Council’s more in-depth treatment of the topics of war, peace, conscience, and individual responsibility.  “Franz Jagerstatter: Letters and Writings from Prison” and the 2019 film “A Hidden Life” also offer insights into Jagerstatter,, who was beatified by the Catholic Church in 2007. Unknown to Jagerstatter, his time at Berlin-Tegel prison briefly overlapped with Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Protestant pastor and theologian, who was arrested and later executed for assisting Jews and resisting the Nazi regime.