Saint of the day: St. Katharine Drexel

(1858-1955)

Foundress of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament

Her life: 

+ Katharine was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, into one of the wealthiest families in America. While visiting Europe as a young woman, she worked to recruit priests and religious to serve the needs of Native Americans. 

+ During this same trip, during a papal audience, Pope Leo XIII suggested that Katharine herself become a missionary. The following year, she established schools in the Dakotas, Wyoming, Montana, California, Oregon, and New Mexico. 

+ In 1889, Katharine entered the novitiate of the Sisters of Mercy, and, in 1891, she professed religious vows as the first member of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament for Indian and Colored People. 

+ Opening a novitiate in Philadelphia, she received 21 new sisters in the first year. The community established its first mission in New Mexico. In the years that followed, Katharine opened dozens of other missions and schools across the South and Southwest, including Xavier University in New Orleans. 

+ Following a heart attack in 1935, Mother Drexel was forced to return to the motherhouse. There, she dedicated the remainder of her life to prayer and contemplation. She died on March 3, 1955, and was canonized in 2000. In 2018, the relics of Saint Katharine Drexel were translated to the Cathedral Basilica of Ss. Peter and Paul in Philadelphia. 

For prayer and reflection: 

“If we wish to serve God and love our neighbor well, we must manifest our joy in the service we render to Him and them. Let us open wide our hearts. It is joy which invites us. Press forward and fear nothing.”—Saint Katharine Drexel

Spiritual bonus: 

On March 3 we also remember Blessed Pierre-René Rogue. A Vincentian priest serving in Vannes, France, he was martyred on March 3, 1796, for refusing to take an oath of allegiance to the newly established post-revolutionary French government. Blessed Pierre-René was beatified in 1934.

Prayer +

God of love,
you called Saint Katharine Drexel
to teach the message of the Gospel
and to bring the life of the Eucharist
to the Native American and African American peoples;
by her prayers and example,
enable us to work for justice
among the poor and the oppressed,
and keep us undivided in love
in the eucharistic community of your Church.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever. Amen.

(from The Roman Missal)