“I am no longer my own. I have given myself entirely to Jesus Christ.” Saint Kateri Tekakwitha

July 14th in the U. S. (April 17th in Canada) marks the feast day of a saint whose life story could be seen merely as one of sadness and suffering. Viewing that same life story through the lens of faith, however, elicits an entirely different perception.

Kateri Tekakwitha was born in 1656 at Ossernenon, today’s Auriesville, New York. Jesuit missionaries, or “Blackrobes,” labored in the area catechizing the native people. Tekakwitha’s father was a chief of their fearsome Mohawk clan; her mother, a gentle Algonquin Catholic whose piety made its way to Tekakwitha through early memories and stories related by others.

At age four, Tekakwitha fell ill during a village smallpox epidemic that took both her parents and younger brother. She was left with scarred, pockmarked skin, diminished health, and extremely poor eyesight; one translation of the name Tekakwitha is “One who walks groping for her way.”

Tekakwitha’s uncle, also a chief, and two aunts assumed her care, and their clan resettled near Fonda, New York. Health issues notwithstanding, Tekakwitha fell into the daily routine – field work, tending vegetable gardens, caring for the communal longhouse, learning beadwork and basket weaving. A kind, loving girl, she assisted where needed, humbly performing numerous duties.

Like all Indigenous peoples, Tekakwitha’s clan maintained a close relationship with nature. Tekakwitha learned the importance of tending the land, showing gratitude for its produce, and conserving its resources. A very strong, ancient spiritual component guided her people’s daily lives. Their conservation efforts and respect for all of nature arose from their belief that the resources they enjoyed were gifts of a great and powerful Creator Spirit who understood their needs.

Although a fully functioning member of her community, in one particular matter, Tekakwitha steadfastly refused to submit to native tradition and familial demands. When a suitor was chosen for her according to custom, she maintained her firm intention to remain unmarried, countercultural to be sure.

Spending silent, solitary time in nature afforded opportunities for Tekakwitha to commune with God, allowing Him to speak to her heart. When Father Jacques de Lamberville arrived at their settlement, Tekakwitha thrived on the stories he told of the life of Jesus. She expressed her great desire to be catechized, and Father de Lamberville began instructing her in the faith.

Easter of 1676 saw the 20-year old baptized Kateri, for Saint Catherine of Siena. This joyful occasion was tempered by great difficulty. Since Kateri performed no work on Sundays and holydays, she was permitted no food on those days. She was threatened, taunted, and treated as an outcast at times. Some native customs contrary to Church teachings, while she didn’t participate, caused her much sorrow. Throughout, she held to her belief in her own dignity and the dignity of every person with whom she came into contact.

At Father de Lamberville’s suggestion, and escorted by several other converts, Kateri undertook an arduous journey of more than 200 miles to the Saint Francis Xavier Mission at Sault Saint Louis near Montreal. One biographer describes the Native Americans there as “possibly … one of the most devout groups of Christians to have ever lived in community.” Kateri would thrive with others like herself, on fire with love for the faith.

In this gentler spiritual environment, Kateri’s life in grace blossomed a hundredfold. She immersed herself in constant prayer, the rosary, Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, works of mercy toward young and old, and severe fasting and bodily mortifications. Kateri eagerly sought instruction from the Jesuits and from a kindly older Catholic woman mentor. On Christmas morning, 1677, she rejoiced to receive her much-desired First Communion.

Kateri’s motto was said to be, “Who can tell me what is most pleasing to God that I may do it?”

In 1679, with the consent of her spiritual director, Kateri took an extraordinary step – she made a vow of perpetual virginity, the first such instance recorded among her people. Her wish to devote herself entirely to Jesus, the only love of her life, was fulfilled.

In the words of Saint Pope John Paul II: “Even when she dedicated herself fully to Jesus Christ, to the point of taking the prophetic step of making a vow of perpetual virginity, she always remained what she was, a true daughter of her people, following her tribe in the hunting seasons and continuing her devotions in the environment most suited to her way of life, before a rough cross carved by herself in the forest.”

Kateri spent the final three years of her life joyfully living out the faith she loved. Her health, never hardy, depleted from daily toil and harsh penances, finally gave way. On April 17, 1680, Kateri passed into the loving arms of the One to Whom she had devoted her all. Her final words affirmed what her brief life had represented – her all-consuming love for Jesus.

Persons of faith would not find it remarkable that, minutes after her passing, those in attendance noted that her face had become peaceful, serene, and radiantly beautiful, finally free of all traces of suffering.

Kateri Tekakwitha, the gentle, humble, faith-filled “Lily of the Mohawks,” was beatified by Saint Pope John Paul II in 1980 and canonized by Pope Benedict XVI in 2012. The first Native American saint from the territories of the future United States and Canada, she is patroness of Native American and First Nations Peoples, integral ecology, and the environment.

In honor of her feast day, we echo the words of Pope Benedict XVI: “We entrust to you the renewal of the faith in the First Nations and in all of North America! May God bless the First Nations!”

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