Rajmund Kolbe is a Polish boy who lives with his mother, Maria, his father, Julius, and his brothers, Franciszeck and Josef. Because they are poor, Rajmund cannot attend school but, one day, as soon as the village pharmacist hears him pronounce the names of medicines in Latin that he could hardly remember, he offers to teach him everything he knows. Kolbe studied in Poland and Italy where he graduated in philosophy and theology and also obtained a doctorate. After coming to power, Adolf Hitler issues anti-Semitic laws and expands Germany's borders by attacking Poland where the largest Jewish community lives. Kolbe is imprisoned together with other brethren and then taken to the Auschwitz concentration camp. The Niepokalanów convent, which had given refuge to thousands of people, 1500 of whom were Jews, was closed by the Nazis. One day, one of the inmates escaped. The Nazis in revenge condemn ten prisoners to death in the hunger bunker, one of whom exclaims: "My wife! My children!". Then Kolbe, fulfilling the mission for which he had come into the world, makes his choice.