Stein's writings, both early and late, are not so much an invitation to agreement as they are an invitation to rethink in her company the issues with which she was concerned. And, since she generally and characteristically identified those issues that were and are philosophically crucial, this makes her a significantly more important thinker than she has often been taken to be.

Alasdair MacIntyre, Edith Stein: A Philosophical Prologue, 1913–1922

The love of Christ was the fire that inflamed the life of Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross. Long before she realized it, she was caught by this fire. At the beginning she devoted herself to freedom. For a long time Edith Stein was a seeker. Her mind never tired of searching and her heart always yearned for hope. She traveled the arduous path of philosophy with passionate enthusiasm. Eventually she was rewarded: she seized the truth. Or better: she was seized by it. Then she discovered that truth had a name: Jesus Christ.

Pope John Paul II, from his Homily for the Canonization of Edith Stein, October 11, 1998

Just as in the early church the martyrs died because they would not say ‘Caesar is Lord’ (they knew that this was what Jesus was), so with Edith Stein. . . . When she was summoned to the convent parlour by the SS commandant who was rounding up the Jews in the area. He greeted her with the words ‘Heil, Hitler’, and she greeted him with what she said to her sisters every morning of her life: ‘Laudetur Jesus Christus’ (‘Jesus Christ be praised’). There, you might say, are the two lordships in conflict in the 1930s; her response was once again in the form of a life making sense of a senseless and terrible world.

Rowan Williams, Luminaries: Twenty Lives That Illuminate the Christian Way

Thanks to this thoughtfully-curated little sampler of Stein’s work, published by Plough as part of their Spiritual Guides series, there is now an entry-level invitation for contemporary readers to listen to what a modern mystic and martyr has to teach us about navigating our own turbulent era. …For those of us who see our own world on fire, spending time with Edith Stein’s words may help orient us to what it takes to walk through the flames, one foot in front of the other, on the narrow path with Jesus.

Mere Orthodoxy

Part of the Plough Spiritual Guides series, this little book assembles excerpts from Stein’s philosophical and theological works, including her poetry. As the series title suggests, a key aim is the reader’s spiritual formation. In the process, one question addressed is this: How do we flourish spiritually in a “world on fire”? As we face the brokenness of our own world today, this is our question as well.

Christian Century