Kateri Tekakwitha, known as the Lily of the Mohawks, was born in 1656 in present-day upstate New York to a Mohawk father and an Algonquin Christian mother. Orphaned and scarred by smallpox as a child, she was baptized by Jesuit missionaries at about age twenty and lived a life of deep prayer at the mission village of Kahnawake near Montreal, where she died on April 17, 1680, at only twenty-four. Canonized in 2012, she is the first Native American saint.
Kateri held onto her faith gently but firmly, even when it cost her the acceptance of her own community, and she carried her sufferings — illness, loss, and weakness — with quiet trust in God. Her short, hidden life shows that holiness is not measured in years or accomplishments, but in the love with which we offer each day to God.
Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, who loved Jesus with a pure and steadfast heart through suffering and short years, pray for us and for all the young whom God calls close to Himself. Amen.