Bronislaw Markiewicz was born on July 13, 1842, in eastern Poland, at the time annexed to the Russian empire, into a modest household that would eventually include eleven children. At the age of 18, he lost his faith. “I wanted to adapt to my teachers’ views,” he would write… “Along with faith in God, I lost the peace in my soul and my sense of interior harmony. I was overcome by sadness.” In his despair, Bronislaw turned to the great Polish authors. Touched by one of them, he fell to his knees and exclaimed, “My God, if You exist, make me know You! … May I see the Truth, and spend my life in thanksgiving! To gain this, I am willing to suffer any mortification.”
