Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, Virgin

Memorial of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, Virgin

Today's Gospel reading helps us better understand the life of the first American Native saint, St. Kateri Tekakwitha. She is a saint of our diocese right in Auriesville, New York. The Shrine of Our Lady of Martyrs at her birthplace in Auriesville, New York, is the place that is hosting the Eucharist Congress for the whole of New York State this coming October.

At age 19, Kateri Tekakwitha converted to Catholicism, taking a chastity vow, and promising to marry only Jesus Christ. Her decision was very unpopular with her adoptive parents and their neighbors.

Kateri Tekakwitha was persecuted by her adopted family and neighbors because of her faith in Jesus Christ. What Jesus said to his disciples also happened the same way with St. Catherine.

"Brother will hand over brother to death, and the father his child; children will rise up against parents and have them put to death. You will be hated by all because of my name, but whoever endures to the end will be saved. When they persecute you in one town, flee to another."

After six months of mockery and accusations of magic, she knew she needed to move on. To avoid persecution, by the advice of a Jesuit priest, she traveled to a Christian native community south of Montreal.

In a new place, Kateri found an environment where she could enter more deeply into union with Christ. Kateri consecrated her virginity to Christ, saying, "I have consecrated myself entirely to Jesus, son of Mary, I have chosen him for husband, and he alone will take me for wife."

Kateri' once said, "Who can tell me what is most pleasing to God that I may do it?" She spent much of her time in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament, kneeling in the cold chapel for hours. Kateri loved the Rosary and carried it around her neck always. Kateri taught the young and helped poor or sick people in the village.

Her favorite devotion was to fashion crosses out of sticks and place them throughout in places to remind her spending time in prayers.

Kateri performed mortifications as penances. For example, she put thorns on her sleeping mat and offered to pray for the conversion and forgiveness of her fellow Mohawks. After the effects of her penances weakened her health, Kateri's last days were spent in great suffering.

In April 1680, the Wednesday of Holy Week, she died at 3 p.m. at the age of twenty-four. Her last words were: "Jesos Konoronkwa" [Jesus, I Love You]. Fifteen minutes after her death, before the eyes of two Jesuits and some the Native Americans, the ugly scars on her body suddenly disappeared.

What a beautiful example for each of us following Jesus, who promises that "whoever endures to the end will be saved."