Corrie Ten Boom, a Dutch woman who lived during the Second World War and the occupation of her country by Nazi Germany, faced atrocities few of us ever face. Together with their aged father, she and her sister were arrested and taken to a Nazi concentration camp. Their “crime”? Giving shelter to Jews (whom the Nazis were determined to exterminate). Her father died in the camp. Later, her sister perished from the inhuman treatment meted out to them by the women guards of the camp. Corrie never lost hope. She was not afraid. She brought hope and even peace of heart to many of the other inmates. In the midst of inhuman cruelty, Corrie would say, “However the deep the darkness, His love is deeper still.”
Others wondered why this woman was not afraid of death. She shared her secret in a book she wrote after the war, The Hiding Place. She narrates what she learnt from her very inspiring father, a man of deep faith. One night, when she was six years old, her loving daddy was putting her to sleep. Corrie told him, “Daddy, I feel scared of death.”
Her father sat on her bed, and asked Corrie, “Corrie, what do I do when you have to make a trip?”
Fr Joe Mannath SDB
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