One of the things closest to the heart of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe was his hope that a ‘City of the Immaculate’ (in Polish, ‘Niepokalanów’) would be founded in every country. In these ‘cities’, the Blessed Virgin would be recognised as Queen, and the friars who lived there would work tirelessly under their Heavenly patroness so as to aid the Immaculata’s missionary mandate to win all souls for her Divine Son, Jesus Christ. It was envisaged that, in every country in which it was founded, the City of the Immaculata would become the national centre for the Militia of the Immaculata (MI).

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In the history of the Franciscan Order, the country of England can consider itself to be the recipient of special benediction. Not only did St. Francis personally commission a group of friars to go to England (arriving on 12th September 1224, under the leadership of Bl. Agnellus of Pisa) but also, in a letter dated 30th July 1932, St. Maximilian M. Kolbe expressly wrote, “May the Lord wish for a Niepokalanów to be established in England as well. After all, if She wants, the Immaculata will overcome all difficulties and establish Niepokalanóws in every nation” (Letter 445: to Fr. Florian Koziura, Niepokalanów). Indeed, this would happen twenty years later. In 1955, the English Niepokalanów (“Little City of Mary Immaculate”) was founded in Manchester by Fr. Jan Burdyszek, OFM Conv. (of Polish origin). The magazine of the “Little City” was first published under the title ‘The Knight of Mary Immaculate’. Later, this title was changed to ‘The Crusader of Mary Immaculate’ (The Crusader) and today, the magazine – which is now published exclusively online – is titled The Golden Thread: The Immaculate today (The Golden Thread).

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The current title of the magazine has generated much interest. What (or who!) is The Golden Thread? Well, in the most recently approved Constitutions of the Order of Friars Minor, Conventual (2019), we read the following short paragraph:

 

The [Franciscan] Order was begun and developed under the particular protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The defence of the truth of her Immaculate Conception is recognised as ‘the golden thread’ of the history of our Order. Therefore, every work of the brotherhood is to be lived in the service of the Church of God, so that under the guidance of Mary Immaculate, the Kingdom of Christ may be extended through all the earth [Chapter I: Title I: §6, emphasis added]

 

The Golden Thread, then, at least in the mind of Conventual Franciscans, is to be understood as the radiant and unbroken efforts made by Franciscan friars, throughout the centuries, to defend the truth of Mary’s Immaculate Conception. The term ‘the Golden Thread’ was also used by St. Maximilian M. Kolbe himself. In a letter [dated 26th September 1918] to his brother Alfons Kolbe, Fr. Maximilian wrote the following, some five months after his priestly ordination

 

Our [Franciscan] Order has the good fortune to be under her particular protection, under the title that she prefers in the highest degree, and the one that she chose to be called in Lourdes: ‘Immaculate Conception’…beginning with our Father St. Francis and St. Bonaventure, devotion to the Immaculate Conception has been a particular feature of our Order; Duns Scotus and the Franciscan school then defended this privilege, which she greatly appreciated; and now it has coalesced in the solemn definition of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception. This is, therefore, the golden thread of our Order and, perhaps, also the beginning of the renewal of our corrupt society…let us prepare to fight against Satan, the world, and… ourselves – to save and sanctify our souls and as many other souls as possible – let us prepare to suffer and to work. We can rest after death. (Letter 21, in The Writings of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe, vol. I [Letters] ed. Di Piazza, Firenze, 2015, p.373, emphasis added).

 

His brother Alfons would, in July 1930, be appointed as Guardian of Niepokalanów (in Warsaw) by the Provincial Chapter, and would die in the December of that same year. Two years later (in a letter dated 28th February 1933) Fr. Maximilian M. Kolbe – writing from Nagasaki (Japan) – would encourage Conventual Franciscan seminarians by penning the following words:

 

From the dawn of our Order, for seven centuries, the golden thread of the cause of the Immaculata has constantly evolved. We fought for recognition of the truth of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Our fight ended in victory. This truth is recognized worldwide and has been declared a dogma of faith. (Letter 486, in The Writings of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe, vol. I [Letters], p.1007, emphasis added).

 

Finally, it should be noted that, in one of his letters, Fr. Maximilian M. Kolbe uses the phrase ‘Golden Thread’ to refer to Mary Immaculate herself

 

Our Loving Mother knows how to conduct things and to overcome obstacles. The Immaculata, this golden thread for all the centuries of existence of our Order – it is right that she should have her magazine anywhere there is the Franciscan presence. (Letter 99: to Fr. Petru Iosif Pal, Romania, 30th September 1924 in The Writings of St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe, vol. I [Letters], p.492, emphasis added).

 

So, the title The Golden Thread is one that both reflects the unstinting Marian charism of the Franciscan Order, and can also be used to speak of the Immaculate Virgin herself. That the Blessed Virgin Mary can be described using such beautiful imagery, is something familiar to Christians from the earliest days of the Church. We end this short overview with a fitting meditation on the glorious Mother of God, by St. John Henry Newman:

 

She [the Blessed Virgin] is the house and the palace of the Great King, of God Himself. Our Lord, the Coequal Son of God, once dwelt in her. He was her Guest; nay, more than a guest, for a guest comes into a house as well as leaves it. But our Lord was actually born in this holy house. He took His flesh and His blood from this house, from the flesh, from the veins of Mary. Rightly then was she made to be of pure gold, because she was to give of that gold to form the body of the Son of God. She was golden in her conception, golden in her birth. She went through the fire of her suffering like gold in the furnace, and when she ascended on high, she was, in the words of our hymn, Above all the Angels in glory untold, Standing next to the King in a vesture of gold (St. John Henry Newman, Meditation IV, May 6, ‘Mary is the “Domus Aurea” – the House of Gold, Meditations on the Litany of Loretto for the Month of May)