This week on Fresh Ground Theology’s The Weekend Cup, Saint Kateri Tekakwitha’s story continues after her death. Friends and spiritual mentors reported seeing her alive and radiant. Healings connected with her grave, relics, and intercession soon spread her reputation beyond Kahnawake. Her veneration continued for centuries. It eventually led to her beatification in 1980 and to an investigation involving Jake Finkbonner, a young member of the Lummi Nation who suffered from a devastating flesh-eating infection.

People prayed for Kateri’s intercession and applied her relic to Jake. Soon afterward, the infection stopped spreading, and Jake recovered. This healing contributed to Kateri’s canonization in 2012. Today, she is honored as a patroness of Indigenous peoples, ecology, the environment, and Traditional Ecological Knowledge. She is also remembered as a spiritual companion to orphans, exiles, and Christians who face ridicule because of their faith. Her story invites an honest discussion of colonial injustice, Indigenous identity, Catholic veneration, and Christ’s power to work through wounded people and complicated historical circumstances.

Listen to part 1: Saint Kateri Tekakwitha pt1 – Fresh Ground Theology

Listen to part 2: Northward to a New Home: Saint Kateri Tekakwitha Part 2 – Fresh Ground Theology

Sources: Ellen H. Walworth, The Life and Times of Kateri Tekakwitha: The Lily of the Mohawks; Pierre Cholenec, The Life of Catherine Tekakwitha; Claude Chauchetière, The Life of the Good Catherine Tekakwitha; Allan Greer, Mohawk Saint; Mark G. Thiel and Christopher Vecsey, Native Footsteps; Pope Benedict XVI’s 2012 canonization homily; the National Shrine of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha; the Saint Regis Mohawk Tribe.

Music: Adventure Beyond by Alexander Nakarada (https://creatorchords.com)

Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0