Today, March 31, is the commemoration of Blessed Natalia Tulasiewicz.
Born in 1906 in Poland, Natalia worked as a teacher and led the local lay apostolate.
When World War II happened, Natalia decided to join underground educators in Krakow. She voluntarily went to Germany to join women forced into hard labor, as she wanted to teach them catechism and provide spiritual comfort.
The Gestapo, the Nazi secret police, discovered her secret mission. They tortured her and then condemned her to die in the Ravensbruck concentration camp.
On Good Friday 1945, weakened by countless horrible tortures, Natalia stood on a chair and gave a talk to the prisoners on the passion and resurrection of Jesus.
She was killed in the gas chamber on Easter Sunday 1945. She was beatified, along with 107 other martyrs of World War II, by Pope St. John Paul II in 1999.