A saint for today

Faithful Catholics take great comfort in reaching out, through prayer, to the communion of saints, triumphant and penitent. Many Catholics even keep a kind of on-call list of favourite saints based on namesakes, vocations and intentions. We invoke Mary for issues related to motherhood, we plead Peregrine’s assistance for loved ones with cancer, we call out to St. Anthony of Padua for all things lost, from keys to causes.

​Fr. Myles Gaffney wants to add Saint Kateri Tekakwitha to the list of saints Canadians call on when they seek God’s help. The current vicar of Indigenous Affairs, Fr. Gaffney now serves the Calgary Diocese as the pastor of St. Michael’s parish in Pincher Creek. 

There, he spends much of any free time researching and writing about Saint Kateri. While her indigenous heritage makes Kateri a somewhat obvious choice as a protectress of Canada, the environment and ecology, Fr. Gaffney says contemporary Catholics have much to learn from this saint’s experience of advanced prayer. “That’s something a lot of people don’t know about her, but it should really strike a chord in today’s world. Kateri could be the greatest contemplative that we know about in North America.” 

Fr. Gaffney learned about Kateri when writing his first book, Signposts of our Faith: Canadian Witnesses to Vocation and Mission. That book was published in 2010 and by the time Fr. Gaffney took a 2016 sabbatical to study her life further, the priest was recognized as a Kateri scholar. During his sabbatical, the priest visited Kateri shrines in upstate New York and studied almost 400 pages of biographies and letters, including reports from first-hand witnesses of her life and miracles.

That research informs a presentation the priest has given at international Kateri Conferences, seminaries in the United States and Canada. He’s also presented to smaller groups of indigenous peoples and Catholics who want to learn more about the first Native North American Saint. Fr. Gaffney says the presentation is a work-in-progress that may eventually be published in book form.

A saint for today
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Also known as the Lily of the Mohawks, Kateri (baptized Catherine) was born in Iroquois territory before the United States was formed. She died near present-day Montreal in 1680 at the age of 24. Although badly scarred by a smallpox, her face cleared within minutes of her death. Since then, hundreds of healings have been attributed to Tekakwitha. The second miracle in her cause of canonization involved the sudden healing of a young indigenous man in Washington state in 2006. Afflicted with Necrotizing Fasciitis (flesh-eating disease) and near death, he was healed after his parents and a Catholic nun called on then-Blessed Kateri for intervention. The nun also placed a Tekakwitha relic, a fragment of bone, against the boy’s body.

Saint Kateri Tekakwitha was canonized in 2012, 300-plus years after the first miracles were attributed to her intervention. While some debate why her cause for canonization took so long, Fr. Gaffney sees God’s hand in the delay.

“The way Kateri’s Jesuit mentors describe her experience of contemplative prayer, may be without precedent,” says Fr. Gaffney. During his sabbatical, he discovered “some strong connections between her and Divine Mercy.” A devotion to Jesus Christ associated with the apparitions of Jesus to Faustina Kowalska in Poland in the 1930s, Divine Mercy captures the desire to let the love and mercy of God flow through a prayerful heart to those who need it most. While Catholics widely recognize St. Teresa of Avila as a contemplative, or one who prayed with great intensity and devotion, “I think we’re just starting to understand this about Saint Kateri,” says Fr. Gaffney.

In addition to her life of prayer, Fr. Gaffney sees contemporary value in recognizing Saint Kateri as a patron for those who are persecuted for their faith.

Fr. Gaffney encourages Catholics to read about Tekakwitha’s life. “When canonized by Pope Benedict, he entrusted to her the renewal of the faith among the first nations in all of North America. St. John Paul II compared her to the great female saints of history and while there is significant devotion to her in places all over the world, I don’t think she’s well known on our own continent,” says Fr. Gaffney.

“I think the timing of her canonization was providential,” he adds. “I believe that we are just beginning to discover how relevant Saint Kateri is to our times. Her love of prayer, the way she dealt with the distractions of life, her chastity and her intense focus on the world to come are some of the way in which her life speaks to us with force today. We have much to learn from her example.”

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Only known portrait from life of Catherine Tekawitha, c. 1690, by Father Chauchetière

Saint Kateri Prayer
by: Harold Caldwell
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O Saint Kateri, Lily of the Mohawks,
Your love for Jesus,
so strong, so steadfast,
pray that we may become like you.

Your short and painful life 
showed us your strength and humility.
Pray that we may become 
forever humble like you.

Like the bright and shining stars at night,
we pray that your light 
may forever shine down upon us, 
giving light, hope, peacefulness
and serenity in our darkest moments.

Fill our hearts, Saint Kateri Tekakwitha
with your same love for Jesus 
and pray that we have the 
strength and courage 
to become one like you in heaven.
Through Christ our Lord. ​Amen.

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Written by Joy Gregory