Saint Kateri Tekakwitha
Feast day: April 17
Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, “Lily of the Mohawks,” first Native American saint of the US and Canada (17/04)
Who is she?
Saint Kateri Tekakwitha was a young Native American woman who lived in the land that is now the United States and Canada. She is the first Native American of the United States and Canada to be canonized. Because of her pure and gentle life, she is called the “Lily of the Mohawks.”
Life story
Kateri was born in 1656 in the village of Ossernenon, now in New York State, USA. Her father was a Mohawk chief and her mother an Algonquin Christian. When she was four, smallpox, a very serious epidemic disease, took her parents and her little brother. She survived, but her face was scarred and her eyes were very weak, so she had to avoid bright sunlight.
She grew up in her uncle’s house. She was hardworking and skillful, and liked sewing and fetching firewood and water. When the Jesuit priests came to the village, she heard about Jesus and wanted very much to follow him. At Easter 1676, when she was about 20, she was baptized with the saint’s name Kateri, which is Catherine.
Because of her faith, many people in the village mocked and threatened her. The next year, she escaped to the Christian village of Kahnawake, near Montreal, Canada. There, she made her First Communion and lived very close to God. She often made a small cross out of sticks and set it up in the woods so she could stop and pray. She taught children to pray and cared for the elderly and the sick.
Her health had always been poor. On 17 April 1680, she died at about 24 years old. She was declared Blessed in 1980. After the Church recognized a miracle of healing through her prayers, Pope Benedict XVI canonized her on 21 October 2012. The Church’s official list of saints and Canada remember her on 17 April, while the United States celebrates her feast on 14 July.
Why is she a saint?
Saint Kateri loved Jesus with all her heart. She did nothing grand, but she prayed faithfully, lived a pure life and served others. She held on to her faith even when people mocked her and she had to leave her homeland.
A lesson for you
- When friends tease you for going to Mass or praying, keep your faith cheerfully and bravely like Saint Kateri.
- Spend a few minutes in nature thanking God for making heaven and earth.
- Care for those who are weaker than you, and for the elderly and the sick around you.
Identifying marks
- A small cross made of two sticks tied together: she often made crosses like this in the woods so she could stop and pray.
- A white lily: she is called the “Lily of the Mohawks,” because she kept her heart pure and gave herself completely to God.
- A blue shawl over her head: the way Mohawk women dressed; she often covered her head to shade her weak eyes and her face, scarred by smallpox.
- Woods beside the Saint Lawrence River: where she lived her last years, near Montreal.
- A Rosary (*): she prayed the Rosary very faithfully.
(*) Only in some pictures and statues.
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