Mississippi, 1944. Claude Newman, a twenty-year-old African American man, awaited execution in the state prison.
Born in 1923, Claude Newman grew up in Bovina, Warren County, Mississippi. At age five, he had left his mother to be raised by his grandmother Ellen. He began working at an early age on the Ceres Plantation in Bovina where Sid Cook, the man who would marry his grandmother, also worked.
One day, when Claude was nineteen, he witnessed Cook beating and abusing his beloved grandmother. In a fit of rage, the boy killed the aggressor and fled the scene. They arrested him several weeks later. Tried and found guilty of first-degree murder, he was sentenced to die in the electric chair.
One evening, while sitting in jail, Claude noticed a little oval disk hanging from the neck of one of his four cellmates. Intrigued by the object, he asked about it. When told it was a “miraculous medal,” he inquired further. His cellmate, frustrated at his inability to give a satisfactory explanation, cursed and, tearing the “piece of tin” from his neck, threw it to the ground at Claude’s feet. Claude picked it up, delighted with his new acquisition, and after getting the guard’s permission, wore it around his neck.
A few nights later Claude had a strange experience. According to his account to the priest, he felt someone touch him in the middle of the night, and he awoke in terror. Standing by him was a Lady—“the most beautiful God ever created.” At first he was terrified and did not know what to make of it. But she said to him, “If you would like me to be your Mother, and you would like to be my child, then send for a priest of the Catholic Church.” And saying this, she disappeared. Since Claude had had no previous contact with the Catholic Church, it would never have occurred to him that a priest could help him in any way much less lead him to salvation. But he complied with the Lady’s instructions.
Catechesis
And so, the very next morning, Father Robert O’Leary, a missionary priest working in the area, came to visit Claude in his cell. Newman told him of the mysterious visit, after which, to O’Leary’s great surprise, Claude and his cellmates asked him to explain it all to them. The priest’s attitude was somewhat skeptical even though the four other prisoners assured him that Claude’s story was true. None of the others had seen the Lady or heard her voice. The missionary priest agreed to give them catechism essons.
Claude could neither read nor write, since he had never attended school. He lacked the rudiments of religious knowledge. In fact, he knew practically nothing. He did not know who Jesus was. All he knew was that God existed. So began Claude’s lessons. His cellmates also took part. But Claude soon proved to be an extraordinary student.
The mystery of confession
One day, Fr. O’Leary began teaching about the sacrament of confession. Great was his surprise when Claude said: “Oh, I know about that! The Lady told me that when we go to confession we are kneeling down not before a priest, but we’re kneeling down by the cross of her Son. And that when we are truly sorry for our sins, and we confess our sins, the blood He shed flows down over us and washes us free from all sins.”
The priest was amazed. When he took Claude aside, out of earshot of the others, the young man said to him seriously: “She told me that if you doubted me or showed hesitancy, I was to remind you that, lying in a ditch in Holland in 1940, you made a vow to her, which she’s still waiting for you to keep.” Claude went on to tell him exactly what the vow was. This incredible revelation fully convinced Fr. O’Leary that was Our Lady who spoken to the young man.
Claude encouraged his companions: “You should not be afraid to go to confession. You’re really telling God your sins, not the priest” Then Claude said, “You know, the Lady said that confession is something like a telephone. We talk through the priest to God, and God talks back to us through the priest.”
The mystery of Holy Communion
A week or two later, Fr. O’Leary was about to teach the five prisoners about the Blessed Sacrament. Once more, Claude indicated that the Blessed Mother had already told him about it. With the priest’s permission, he began to explain: “The Lady told me that in Communion, I will only see what looks like a piece of bread. But she told me that it is really and truly her Son, and that He will be with me just as He was with her before He was born in Bethlehem. She told me that I should spend my time like she did during her lifetime with Him— in loving Him, adoring Him, thanking Him, praising Him and asking Him for blessings. I shouldn’t be distracted or bothered by anybody else or anything else, but I should spend those few minutes in my thoughts alone with Him.”
The catechism lessons finally came to an end. On January 16, 1944, Claude Newman was baptized into the Catholic Church along with his cellmates. His execution was to take place four days later, at five past midnight. On the eve of the execution Sheriff Williamson asked Claude if he had any last request. To the sheriff’s surprise, he said he wanted to celebrate a holy hour. Claude was happy that he would soon be meeting Jesus whom he had come to love deeply and who had forgiven all of his sins in the sacraments of baptism and reconciliation. And so, the prison guards spent a holy hour with Claude and his companions, taking part in the Stations of the Cross and also praying for Claude. After that, Fr. O’Leary brought in the Blessed Sacrament and gave Claude Holy Communion. Then together they knelt down, praying, and waited. The hour of execution was approaching.
Loving sacrifice
Suddenly, just a quarter of an hour before the execution, Sheriff Williamson ran in with news that Claude had received a stay of execution for a period of two weeks. The sheriff and district attorney had been doing their best to save his life. Claude burst into sobs. O’Leary and Williamson assumed these were sobs of joy and relief over the temporary reprieve. But Claude said to them: “You don’t understand! If you ever saw her face, and looked into her eyes, you wouldn’t want to live another day! What have I done wrong these past weeks,” he asked the priest, “that God would refuse me my going home? Why Father? Why must I still remain here for two weeks?”
The life of every believer is only a preparation for his encounter with the Merciful Jesus, and Claude felt himself quite ready for this. But besides answering for their own salvation, Christians are responsible for the salvation of others; and in this connection they have an important role to play. St. Paul speaks of this when he says: “I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account” (Phil. 1: 23-24). The experienced Father O’Leary knew this well. Suddenly he understood that there was in Claude’s situation a divine plan. It concerned James Hughes, a convicted murderer, who though he had been raised a Catholic, had led a highly immoral life and had recently been condemned to death. “Maybe Our Blessed Mother wants you to offer this denial of being with her for his conversion,” suggested the priest. “Why don’t you offer to God every moment that you are separated from your heavenly Mother for this prisoner, so that he will not be separated from God for all eternity.” Claude thought it over for a moment, and then agreed. He asked Fr. O’Leary to teach him a prayer that he could offer up for Hughs’ intention. Later that same day Claude confided his apprehensions to O’Leary, “James hated me before, but, oh Father, how he hates me now!” Nevertheless, for the last two weeks of his earthly life, the twenty-year-old prayed ceaselessly for the reprobate James Hughs, forgiving him all and entreating for him the grace of conversion. Fourteen days later, on February 4, 1944, Claude was finally put to death by the electric chair. Fr. O’Leary testified: “I’ve never seen anyone go to his death as joyfully and happily. Even the official witnesses and the newspaper reporters were amazed. They said they couldn’t understand how anyone could go and sit in the electric chair while at the same time actually beaming with happiness.” Claude’s last words to O’Leary were, “Father, I will remember you. And whenever you have a request, ask me, and I will ask her.”
Pledge fulfilled
Three months later, on May 19, 1944, the death sentence was carried out on James Hughs, the white man who so hated Claude Newman. Fr. O’Leary recounts: “This man was the filthiest, most immoral person I had ever come across. His hatred for God and for everything spiritual defied description. He would not allow a priest or any clergyman in his cell. Just before his execution, the county doctor pleaded with him to at least kneel down and say the Our Father before the sheriff would come for him. The prisoner spat in the doctor’s face. When he was strapped into the electric chair, the sheriff said to him, ‘If you have something to say, say it now.’ The condemned man started to blaspheme. All of a sudden he stopped speaking and his eyes became fixed on the corner of the room, and his face turned to one of absolute horror. Suddenly he screamed in terror—a horrible scream that shocked everyone present. Turning to the sheriff, he said, ‘Sheriff, get me a priest!’”
Now Mississippi law required clergymen to be present at executions, but since Hughs threatened to curse God if he saw one, O’Leary had hidden himself behind some reporters. There he prayed for the condemned man. On being summoned, he immediately went up to Hughs, who told him he had been raised a Catholic, but had turned away from his religion when he was eighteen because of his immoral life. When the execution cell had been cleared, he confessed all of his sins with deep repentance and intense fervor.
After everyone had returned to the room, the sheriff asked the condemned man, “Son, what changed your mind?” “Remember that black man Claude—the one whom I hated so much?” replied a totally transformed Hughs. “Well he’s standing there, over in that corner. And behind him with one hand on each shoulder is the Blessed Virgin Mary. And Claude said to me, ‘I offered my death in union with Christ on the cross for your salvation. She has obtained for you this gift of seeing your place in Hell if you do not repent.’ I have been shown my place in Hell, and that’s why I screamed.”
James Hughs was executed shortly afterwards, but thanks to God’s superabundant grace he repented literally in the last moment of his life. “The Lord is not slow about his promise as some count slowness, but is forbearing toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance” (2 Pet. 3:9). But He cannot save us without our participation, without our consent, for He respects our free will.
Claude opened himself up to Mary’s call and clung to Jesus with all his might. Thanks to his prayer and forgiveness, James Hughs, the man who so despised him, was also enabled to respond to the call for repentance at the last moment.
Hope for us
Saint Maximilian Kolbe said that “those who consent to wear the Miraculous Medal,” who come to love the Immaculata with all their heart and fly to her in prayer in all their adversities and temptations, will “quickly, and especially on her feast day, be prevailed upon to make a confession. There is much evil in the world, but let us remember that the Immaculata is more powerful still.”
Mary wishes to lead all sinners to Jesus, who in the sacrament of penance, works the miracle of forgiveness of sins. “When you approach the confessional, know this—says Jesus—, that I Myself am waiting there for you. I am only hidden by the priest, but I Myself act in your soul. (…) From this fount of mercy, souls draw graces solely with the vessel of trust” (Diary, 1602). “[D]espite the misery that you are, I united Myself with you, take away your misery, and give you My mercy. (…) The greater the sinner, the greater the right he has to My mercy. (…) He who trusts in My mercy will not perish, for all his affairs are mine, and his enemies will be shattered at the base of My footstool” (Diary, 723).
St. Maximilian Kolbe consecrated himself daily to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. He knew this to be the simplest and surest route to Christ. Consecrating oneself to the Immaculate Heart of Mary means accepting her help in offering oneself to our One Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. The Miraculous Medal is a sign of this act of total devotion to Jesus through Mary. Among Kolbe’s relics is the medal with which the saint was never parted in life. The Nazis took it from him while interrogating him in the notorious Pawiak prison in Warsaw—before transporting him to the German death camp at Auschwitz. The medal was sent back, along with the rest of his effects, to his home monastery at Niepokalanów.
If we consecrate ourselves daily to Jesus through Mary and wear the Miraculous Medal as a sign of this, we will experience the special graces the saint mentions in his letters: “This person preserved his faith from Jehovah Witness attacks, that one preserved her virginity, this other one regained her peace of mind after over a dozen years of spiritual anguish.”
In moments of doubt, in moments of torment and temptation, in times of evangelization “when trials assail us, the Medal will remind us that we are irrevocably dedicated to the Immaculata”—wrote St. Maximilian, who in an act of heroic love went willingly to his death in the starvation bunker at Auschwitz, having taken the place of a young father of a family.
Our Lady of Fatima declared that total consecration to Jesus through Her Immaculate Heart was the most effective means of protecting humanity from atheism and eternal destruction.
Only Christ’s mercy can conquer the menace of evil that hangs over those who disregard and scorn God. But Christ needs our consent that He may save us and, through us, reach the greatest sinners with His love. He gives us His own Mother that she may teach us what it is to have a lively faith and thus lead us to Him, the one Source of our Salvation.
Being all for Jesus through Mary as expressed in the wearing of the Miraculous Medal means the following: 1. Despising sin and living in accordance with the teachings of the Catholic Church. 2. Daily reading of the Holy Scriptures, praying the rosary and chaplet of Divine Mercy. 3. Making a regular sacramental confession so as to remain in a state of sanctifying grace. 4. Frequent reception of the Eucharist and adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. 5. The practice of first Fridays and Saturdays of the month for the reparation of our sins and those of the whole world, and if possible fasting on bread and water on Wednesdays and Fridays.
Then may we be “blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation” among whom we “shine as lights in the world” (Phil. 2:15).
Editors