Kateri Tekakwitha

Happy Kateri Tekakwhita (Tekakwhita: " That which advances in hésitant" in language iroquoise) (1656 - 1680) was born with Ossernenon, on the edge of the Rivière Mohawk, today in the State of New York. It is first Amerindian of to be béatifiée North America.

His/her mother, converted with Catholicism, was algonquin E whereas his/her father was agnier. Its birthplace made the martyr of Isaac Jogues, Rene Goupil and Jean Lalande. Called the “lily of the Agniers”, sometimes one calls quite simply it Catherine . She is an important character of the ecclesiastical Histoire Canadian.

At the four years age, it loses all its family following an epidemic of Petite pox, and its sight is weakened. When it of at the age, its parents adoptive (uncle and aunt) and the Indian chief oblige to him to choose a husband, but according to the catholic historiographers, it wishes to preserve its Virginité. Its refusal of marriage reduces it almost in Esclavage. She wishes to become Christian, to be baptized. Jacques de Lambertville, a Jesuit, reaches his request after six months of catechumenate, and she is baptized the Easter Day in 1676.

Arrived at the Meadow in 1677 after a difficult voyage, it wishes to become nun and convert the valley iroquoise. It is transformed in the prayer. Its piety impresses the historian François-Xavier Charlevoix, on mission in News-France under the orders of the king Louis XIV. She lived only three years on the edges of the Fleuve the St. Lawrence, but one allots to him to have saved the colony of the Indian destruction, the sight of his tomb having frightened the invaders.

She died the April 17th 1680, at the age the twenty-three one or twenty-four years. Its reputation was spread thanks to the Relations of the Jesuits. Kateri had practiced the fast much. She was declared worthy by Pie XII the January 3rd 1943. Monseigneur Gerard-Marie Coderre governed the transfer of his relics in 1972. Kateri is béatifiée by Jean-Paul II the June 22nd 1980. It is celebrated the July 14th. A sanctuary is devoted to him to the Mission Saint-François-Xavier, with fifteen kilometers downstream from Kahnawake. There is a Katheri-Tekakwhita church in the community Montagnais E of Mashteuiatsh, in the Saguenay-Lake-Saint-Jean. An entirely French-speaking holiday camp in the United States, the Tékakwitha camp, was also named on its behalf

Currency

Who me apprendra
what there is of more pleasant in Dieu
so that I do it?

References in the literature

Kateri Tekakwitha, to which the narrator frequently addresses himself, is mentioned in the Romance Beautiful Losers of Leonard Cohen.

External bonds

detailed Biography
Article developed
Article of the site '' Catholic Culture ''

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