Spirit of Kateri

It's only fitting that the memorial of soon-to-be-canonized Bl. Kateri Tekakwitha should follow so close to that of St. Benedict's, considering how just weeks after I arrived back in the States from my four months of monastic discernment in Italy, I began living and working with Franciscan friars on the Navajo Reservation in Northeastern Arizona.  The transition from a very traditional, very Latin monastery in the cloistered mountains of Umbira to a mission chapel in the middle of a most desolate, most impoverished desert was indeed some what strange; neither of the two settings were in the least bit of my familiarity.  Yet in the most profound way, the desert proved to encompass a more naturally innate solitude than the monastery ever could: beautiful, hauntingly vast, eerily endless, but beautiful.

And the Spirit of Kateri is very much alive with the Navajo people, both Catholic and non-Catholic alike.  Although she belonged to the Algonquin and Iroquois tribes of 17th century French Canada, this "Lily of the Mohawks" has been accepted by countless Native Americans as a model of virtue, conversion, and purity.  While working as a catechist with children and adults around the different missions which dotted the highland desert, it was amazing how well and eager the Navajo were to make connections between Catholicism and their native spirituality.  Everything from creation stories, tales of love, trickery, and miracles, to legendary figures who withstand time, it is evident that the Holy Spirit has been working with and preparing these people to be evangelized and receive the Truth since their very beginnings.  One of my favorites includes the mystical figure Changing Woman.  This woman, who is present throughout the Navajo oral tradition and takes different forms in each story, has been seen by many to symbolize the Blessed Virgin Mary in the way she has come to us in different apparitions throughout our history since her Assumption.  These, along with other ways of expressing and teaching our faith to native spiritualities, has helped me come to greater grips on the universality of our Church and the mystical outreach of God's grace among all peoples.

Kateri, like all Native Americans, was no foreigner to the consequence of foreign take over.  Stricken by small pox at a very young age (which left her face scarred), Kateri was eventually left orphaned as a result of war and famine by the time the French had occupied the region.  Even before her conversion, at thirteen years of age the young Lily had devoted herself to a life of purity by choosing to remain a virgin and refusing to be wed.  Once the Jesuits had established their missions, she was baptized at the age of twenty and it was then that she was given the name Kateri (Katherine).  This is remarkable considering that the practice of these missionaries at the time was to hold off baptisms until a time when the native is close to death just to be safe that they would not turn back to their old ways.  Baptizing a native at this young age is a testament to how serious and sincere Kateri had become as a follower of Christ.  Despite the great sufferings she had already known, with all the joy she had for her faith and the grace she had been given, Kateri led an austere life of mortification and penance for the mercy and conversion of her kinsmen.  Continuing to live out her faith, she was eventually ostracized by her people and lived among other devout female converts just as herself, forming a sort of religious community under the direction of the Jesuit missionaries.  It was within this mission community that Kateri died at the age of 24, beginning what would be a history of miracles attributed toward her intercession along with a wide-range of peoples who place hope in their devotion toward her prayers and witness.

Bl. Kateri Tekawitha saw her earthly life for what it truly was: temporal and passing, yet a gift from God as the only opportunity we have to come closer to Him through His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, before we pass from this life onto the next.  Surrounded by the reality of life and death from a very young age, Kateri knew how important it was to prepare for the moment she stood before her Father in judgement.  This faith went beyond a concern she had for her own soul, but led her to a life of incessant prayers and penances for the conversion of her people.  How beautiful is this example of agapic love: a love which is lived for another, not for their own sake, but ultimately out of love for God and the gift of love He has given.  The example we have from the Communion of Saints reveals to us the richness of our Church.  Though diverse throughout time, culture, ethnicity, and background, the Saints each stand together as a witness to the unity which is found in our faith: in our love for God and our love for one another. 

In a way the diversity we share on earth, when brought together in the unity of our liturgy, helps us to come to a much deeper understanding of our faith.  Christ has died, Christ has risen, Christ will come again: there are many different angles to look at the one mystery (a crucified God now resurrected).  When celebrated in a different language, a different setting, or a different cultural backdrop, we can enter into not only a deeper level of understanding, but a more sincere level of prayer and reverence we had never before known.  Each Mass we attend should not leave us the same but should send us out into the world with new found faith, and this can be accomplished during the sacred liturgy of a traditional Latin Mass, a Spanish Mass, an English Mass, or a Navajo Mass; the list is endless.  Though celebrated differently the message is still same, Go out into the world and proclaim the Gospel with your life.  This is what it is to be a Saint, not separating religion from the secular, but having the faith to live our religion within the secular.  That's our call to be witnesses to Christ and envangelize, to live our faith.

Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.

And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.  - Matthew 28:19-20

The Little Things of Newness

"So whoever is in Christ is a new creation: the old things have passed away; behold, new things have come." - 2 Corinthians 5:17 (NAB)

There came a point early in my priestly formation when I realized: I am a very different person than I used to be.  Now granted, this is a given when becoming a more mature adult, or at least I always hoped it would be a given.  But no matter how many times I've read, meditated, and prayed over St. Paul's wide-spread theme of the newness which is a consequence of conversion, I never actually thought about how that would become so real and concrete in my life, like it was actually going to happen!  Six years ago I was studying creative writing at Texas State University.  Three years ago I was a Petty Officer 3rd Class in the United States Coast Guard aboard the USCGC Bertholf in Alameda, California.  Two years ago I was honorably discharged and entered seminary formation with the Diocese of Austin, answering the long-standing desire God had placed within me to become a priest.

With these major transitions I had under gone, not only physically but mentally and spiritually as well, I was slowly becoming a new creation.  As a different person at different stages of my life, I had different interests, different friends, different relationships, and a different way of looking at myself, the world, and God.  But its not the big things that catch your attention, its always the little ones.  As a seminarian, I cannot stand most of the movies I enjoyed so much in college, the music that once defined my character, or the literature which sparked my first love for the spirit of the written word.  There simply came a point when they no longer stood significant.  Its not to say that there are no longer movies, music, or books which I enjoy, only that these things no longer have the influence they once held on my life and now they've become exactly that which they always were: things. 

Now the examples which stand out for me are all artistic forms of entertainment, but our gadgets and devices are without a doubt the most potent forms of distraction the modern world is addicted to.  The little things: taken for what they are can make for a pleasant occasion for recreation or a useful tool for communication.  But once they become our means of self-definition and world outlook, when our little things are given a big place we no longer reflect the greatness we are created and called to embody, but are turned into exactly that which controls us: a thing.  I can only make these bold observations on the lot of modern man because, prior to my own conversion, I was once he: distracted, addicted, and completely indifferent to God. 

The other day I noticed just how few things I have left in my possession as seminarians tend to be on the move quite a bit during their formation, between schools, pastoral assignments, and holidays, one cannot hold on to much when one does not know how small or smaller their next living quarters will be (just one of many similarities between seminary and military life).  I recall days prior to leaving for basic training selling boxes and boxes of books, movies, CDs, records, and giving away anything else which couldn't be sold.  Upon being discharged and preparing to enter my first year of seminary formation, I realized just how few things I had left and consequently, just how few things were taking possession of my time and concern.  Consequently, when the things which once not only possessed your mind but gave you self-definition are taken away, a sort of identity crisis can begin to take root.  Perhaps the most significant pain we feel during a conversion is the pain of "self-emptying": a purification of all that we once held as true which can no longer exist alongside the newness we now possess, or better yet, now possess us.  Our fears, or at the very least hesitations, toward conversion lie in our avoidance of this pain and an unwillingness to change, to turn toward the unfamiliar and the uncertain: a Truth which requires faith.

But only when we empty ourselves of ourselves, only then will our conversion begin.  Once this happens, once we turn to Christ through prayer, hear his Word in Scripture, and come together in a community of faithful who are continually undergoing a conversion alongside us, at that point we will begin to be filled with the newness promised to those who seek Him.  Paradoxically (as our faith is filled with paradoxes), the more we look beyond ourselves toward the God around us, the more we dwell in the Spirit, and the more we give our very lives for the sake of selfless love, only then do we discover our true selves.  The more we deny of who we think we are, the more we are given of who we truly are.  St. Paul, the exemplar of conversion, continues, it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me (Galatians 2:20).  Any conversion takes great faith, but for the Catholic Church we do not hold onto the "leap of faith" doctrine.  As children of God, we are given the grace and strength needed to live a life of faith; all that is ours to do is to open ourselves to the God who longs to fill those who seek Him.  Although our God is a mysterious God, no leap is required, only that you begin.

Sure it can be strange to notice yourself as no longer resembling the person you once were, and those closest to you will be the first to recognize it.  However the newness you seek and which now defines you will find peace and consolation in the realization that your identity is now coming closer and closer to that of Christ as the One who gives to you His entire self.  As the little things you once held in great regard take their proper place, only then will the greatness of newness begin to take root in you.  Our emptiness, our weakness, and our vulnerability is given strength in Christ Jesus and the new creation He wills for us to embrace and become.