November 19, Ordinary 33A (Judges 4:1–7)
Irena Sendler, who smuggled hundreds of children out of the Warsaw Ghetto, was a modern-day Deborah.
In 1939, Irena Sendler was in a unique position to render aid to the suffering as a trained and licensed social worker in Warsaw. At the height of the Nazi regime and the persecution of Jews, 29-year-old Sendler—a Catholic and the daughter of a physician who died while serving poor Jewish residents in Otwock during the typhus epidemic of 1917—cared for the neighbors around her. Her vocation allowed her access to the ghetto into which Jews were being corralled, to inspect the harsh conditions. Once inside, she recognized that the survival of many of her neighbors depended on getting them out.
Sendler knew that she could not accomplish the necessary work alone, so she quietly aligned herself with other Polish neighbors who worked to rescue Jews. Members of the Council for Aid to Jews offered vital help in gathering needed resources for people trapped in the ghetto. Drivers helped her access the ghetto and carry needed supplies. Sendler began helping to smuggle Jews out of the ghetto and shepherd them to hiding places.
As more and more Jews were being deported to the death camps, Sendler knew that getting a few supplies in and a few people out of the ghetto would not be enough. She realized the particular danger that young children in the ghetto faced, so she began pleading with parents to allow her to take their children out of the ghetto and try to help them reach safety. Sendler hid children in tool bags, under tarps, in wagons, and any other way she could to smuggle them out of the ghetto. Calling on her network of contacts in orphanages and homes for abandoned children, Sendler utilized every possible resource to save the lives of Warsaw’s Jewish children.
