Catholic Missions In Canada

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1 Lesson 5: Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, the Lily of the Mohawks : North America s First Roman Catholic Aboriginal Saint *This lesson on Kateri Tekakwitha was written and developed by Dr. Christine Mader, a Canadian theologian, educator, and consultant, with a doctorate in theology from the University of St. Michael s College, Toronto. Lesson Goal: Students will learn the story of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha s life, the role of missionaries in her becoming Christian and living a Christian life, and what it means to be recognized publicly as a saint in the Roman Catholic Church (canonization date: October 21, 2012). Lesson Objectives: Students will discover the story of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha s life, both before and after baptism the names of the Jesuit missionaries Kateri encountered in her life and the part they played in her journey to Christian life and her life as a Christian what a saint is how a person becomes a saint in the Roman Catholic Church Teacher Background: Read or tell the story of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, from her birth and childhood to her death in the Christian community of Kahnawake, Canada. Saint Kateri Tekakwitha s Story: Version 1 (for more mature students) some of the following may be used for student note-taking purposes; some details may be omitted Tekakwitha (her name before baptism) was born in about 1656 in Gandaouagué (Ossernenon), a small Iroquois village on the Mohawk River at the far-eastern end of Iroquois territory in what is now Auriesville (near Albany) in New York State. The village was both a commercial and military outpost. Tekakwitha was most likely born into the Turtle Clan, which predominated at Gandaouagué. Her mother was a devout, baptized Catholic, missionized by the Jesuits, who must have shared something of her own faith with her daughter. An Algonquin, Kateri s mother had been dragged to Gandaouagué by a

2 Page 2 of 13 Mohawk war party who captured her and others near Trois-Rivières, between Montreal and Quebec City on the St. Lawrence River. Those who survived the forced march and subsequent tortures were eventually integrated into the Mohawk family (one of the Five Iroquois Nations) and treated with great kindness. The Mohawk believed these captives would re-populate the nation and replenish its spiritual strength. Kateri s mother was one such survivor. At some point, she married a Mohawk man who did not share her faith. When Tekakwitha was a toddler, her entire village moved to a new site just a few kilometres away, where soil fertility was improved and the wood supply was plentiful and close at hand. This was a customary practice for the Iroquois. Later in her life, when she was about ten years old, her Mohawk village, formerly used to mounting its own attacks on others, was suddenly attacked by an Algonquin- Montagnais-French alliance, and burned to the ground. The village had been forewarned of the attack, however, and Tekakwitha would have been among those who watched the destruction of the village s homes from the cover of the surrounding forest. Earlier in her life, at around the age of four or five, Tekakwitha s immediate family (her mother, brother and likely her father) was felled by a smallpox epidemic. She herself had smallpox, which disfigured her with scars, made her eyes extremely sensitive to light, and left her in poor health. She sometimes wore a blanket over her head, to protect her eyes and perhaps to hide her face. It is possible that the name Tekakwitha, perhaps meaning something like she who advances while fumbling, was attached to Kateri at this time. (Another suggested translation of her name is putting things in order. ) Later, the ascetical practices she adopted as penances in her twenties contributed to her decline. Tekakwitha was raised by her aunts and an uncle who was a powerful person in the village and who opposed Christianity. As a girl, Tekakwitha would have helped with the common tasks which were women s responsibilities in the village: collecting firewood, fetching water, planting beans, squash and corn, working in the cornfields, and doing handiwork with porcupine quills, moose hair, eel skin, bark and beads (decorating moccasins and deerskin shirts, making baskets and boxes, preparing mats to be used in the longhouse). She also ground corn into meal, made soup and bread, and fed those in her longhouse. In the course of carrying out the first of these tasks (collecting firewood), Tekakwitha was once knocked unconscious by a falling tree limb. For a time, Tekakwitha was interested in her personal appearance, arraying herself in the typical dress of the Iroquois women of the day and wearing strings of glass beads in her hair. She later thought of this as vanity and a great sin deserving a severe penance. Once Tekakwitha reached marriageable age (which could have been as young as twelve, although the arranged marriage may not have really taken place until a much later date), her relatives began broaching the subject of marriage with her. At one point, they invited a potential spouse to sit beside her in the longhouse, signifying their future relationship, but Kateri was not at all interested and escaped, hiding in the cornfields.

3 Page 3 of 13 Tekakwitha first encountered Jesuit missionaries when they stayed at her uncle s lodge, planning missions among the Iroquois. She would have been about eleven or twelve years old at this time, when she first heard the Black Robes (Fathers Jacques Frémin, Jean Pierron, and Jacques Bruyas) speak about Jesus. Several years later, when she was eighteen, she received her first real instruction in the Christian faith. Confined to her longhouse because of a foot injury, Tekakwitha was visited by the Jesuit missionary to the Mohawk, Father Jacques de Lamberville, who followed an impulse to go into what appeared to be an empty longhouse (all the others were in the fields). He invited her to come to pray at the village chapel, which she did, when her foot was better. She expressed to Fr. Lamberville her worry that her uncle would oppose her becoming a Christian because she might leave her village and go to Kahnawake instead, which other women from her longhouse had already done. Tekakwitha became a catechumen, instructed in the faith by Fr. Lamberville, who likely possessed a working knowledge of the Mohawk language. She wanted to be baptized but delayed it for a time because she did not want to upset her uncle. Tekakwitha was eventually baptized at the age of nineteen with two other Mohawks in the chapel of St- Pierre de Gandaouagué mission on Easter Sunday, She took the Christian baptismal name of Catherine. Catherine was a popular name among the Mohawk, perhaps because it was easier for them to pronounce in their language than other saints names. The idea of receiving a new name and a new identity was already familiar to her from Mohawk cultural practices which sought to renew and preserve in the living the social personalities associated with the names of their deceased members. Kateri was named for Saint Catherine of Siena and she would have listened attentively to the story of Catherine of Siena s life, having the intent of emulating her to the best of her ability, and of renewing in herself the spirit of the saint. About eighteen months after her baptism, Kateri left her native land and went north to Kahnawake (also called Fort Saint-Louis or Sault St. Louis), a Jesuit-sponsored mission settlement, to rid herself of harassment she experienced from the non-christian majority in her village. She joined other Christian Iroquois women who had renounced marriage to embrace virginity instead. Largely made up of Huron or Algonquin war captives, who had left their adoptive Iroquois families to form Christian communities, Kahnawake (meaning at the sault or falls in Mohawk) was near Montreal and was one of the largest and most successful of these kinds of Christianized towns. In Kahnawake, alcohol was strictly forbidden. When Kateri arrived at Kahnawake, she became part of the longhouse of Anastasia Tegonhatsiongo, who was herself a devout Christian and who had been a close friend of Kateri s mother. In Kahnawake, Kateri was able to pursue the practice of her faith more intensely, under Anastasia s watchful eye.

4 Page 4 of 13 In this period of her Christian life, Kateri was guided mostly by the other young and zealous Iroquois women converts at the Fort Saint-Louis prayer village. She learned about how to behave as a Christian, what to do and what to avoid, and how to be vigilant and exacting in her examination of her own behaviour. Jesuit Father Pierre Cholenec, a missionary at Kahnawake, was too busy to provide constant oversight to the growing Christian community there. He served, when he could, as Kateri s confessor and spiritual director. He prepared her for her First Communion which she received sooner than usual, at Christmas in She went on the winter hunt that year, but found it so difficult to be deprived of the Mass, the Eucharist, and daily prayer that she refused to go in the second year, knowing this would mean she would have no meat to eat over the winter. Kateri had a devotion to the Eucharist and attended Mass and prayers as often as she could during her days. She desired nothing more than to learn what pleased God most. Even at Kahnawake, Kateri was pressured to marry since this would have been the normal thing for a woman of her age and culture to do. Marriage would bring a man who could hunt or trap for furs, providing both food and hides that could be made into clothing for the longhouse family. Kateri, however, had no interest in this, believing herself married already to Jesus (Saint Catherine of Siena had believed the same about herself). She took a private vow of virginity, wanting to dedicate herself entirely to God. Kateri, along with two of her friends, planned to make an association in which women would live lives modelled on those of the nuns they had heard about in Quebec and Montreal. They remained dedicated virgins and helped each other in self-mortifications. They were not the only ones there was a penitential fervour in the late 1670s and early 1680s at Kahnawake, in which even the Jesuits noted some excesses, especially after the death of Kateri. Kateri did not initiate the penances she undertook. She learned them from watching Iroquois tortures carried out on war captives and from others at Kahnawake who sought to imitate the sufferings of Jesus, to make up for the sins they believed they and their nations had committed prior to accepting Christianity, and to rid themselves of bodily concerns to pursue freedom of spirit instead. In her pursuit of penances we would think of now as quite harsh, Kateri was often inspired by stories she heard about the saints. She walked barefoot in ice and snow and put coals and burning cinders between her toes, branded her feet the way Iroquois marked their war captives as slaves, beat her own shoulders and sought the assistance of her friends in this task as well. She also fasted, mixed ashes in her food, and slept on a bed of thorns. Fr. Cholenec, knowing these habits had made Kateri sick, insisted on regulating them, but Kateri, who was apparently surrounded by a great light when she was engaged in self-flagellation (which Fr. Cholenec and another Jesuit, Father Claude Chauchetière, took as a sign of divine favour), was determined to continue her ascetical and penitential practices.

5 Page 5 of 13 Eventually, Kateri s penances made her so sick that she could not recover. She lay on a floormat in her longhouse while most of the men and women of the village were out at their hunting camps. Fr. Chauchetière, the junior missionary at Sault St. Louis, visited her daily during her final illness, convinced there was something very special about her, and that she might indeed be a saint. Fr. Cholenec gave her the last rites in her lodge. She died at Kahnawake, Canada, on April 17, 1680 (in the season of Lent that year) at the age of twentyfour. Her final words were: Jesos Konoronkwa ( Jesus, I love you ). It is said a sweet fragrance filled the room upon her passing and that the scars on her face disappeared, revealing a most beautiful countenance. In 1683, it is reported that several Jesuits were saved from death through her intervention when the mission church at Kahnawake collapsed around them in a windstorm. Other healings were attributed to her as well. She is affectionately called the Lily of the Mohawks. French Jesuit Father Claude Chauchetière was her biographer and he led the movement to recognize the Iroquois woman as a saint. In 1943, the Roman Catholic Church declared her venerable and she was beatified in She was canonized by Pope Benedict XVI on October 21, She is the only Native American to have been declared a saint in the Roman Catholic Church. Saint Kateri Tekakwitha s Story: Version 2 (for younger students) More than three hundred years ago, a little girl was born in a small Iroquois village on the Mohawk River in New York State in the United States. Her mother was a very devout and baptized Catholic Algonquin woman and her father was a Mohawk man who followed the traditional ways of his people. They lived all-year round in a longhouse, which kept them cool in the summer and warm in the winter, and most likely, they were members of the Turtle Clan or family, judging from the turtle carving mounted above the door of their longhouse. The little girl s Mohawk name was a long one: Tekakwitha, and it meant either she who goes forward while fumbling or she who puts things in order. When Tekakwitha was just a toddler, her entire village moved a few kilometres away, where the soil was better for growing vegetables and there was more wood to heat their longhouse. The Iroquois often had to do this to survive. Shortly after, when Tekakwitha was four or five years old, the dreadful smallpox disease came to her village, spread by some of their European visitors, and her parents and baby brother all died. Tekakwitha herself also had smallpox but she did not die. She had scars on her face, however, and the disease made her eyes very sensitive to light, and her general health quite poor. She sometimes wore a blanket over her head, to protect her eyes and perhaps to hide her face. After her parents died, Tekakwitha was raised by her aunts and an uncle who was a powerful person in the village and who didn t want anyone in the village to become Christian. Tekakwitha helped with all the chores which were women s responsibilities in the village: she collected firewood, fetched water, and planted beans, squash and corn (called the Three Sisters because they grew so well together). She worked in the cornfields, too, and did handiwork with porcupine quills, moose hair, and glass beads the

6 Page 6 of 13 village got through trading with the Europeans. With these, she decorated moccasins and deerskin shirts. She also made baskets and boxes, and prepared mats for sleeping and sitting in the longhouse. She ground corn into meal, made soup and bread, and fed those in her longhouse, too. One time, when Tekakwitha was collecting firewood, she was hit by a falling tree branch and knocked unconscious. The Mohawk were known for their fierce warriors and attacks, but when Kateri was about ten years old, an alliance of the French and Algonquin Nations suddenly attacked her Mohawk village and burned it to the ground. The villagers (Tekakwitha among them), were forewarned of the attack, however, and watched the destruction of their village from the forest where they were hiding. After this, the Mohawk made peace with the French and rebuilt their village. When Tekakwitha was a young girl, she thought more about her personal appearance and making herself look really good, but when she was an older teenager, she wanted to show her humility before God by dressing much more simply and without jewelry, even though this went against the custom in her clan. She thought it was vain and not right to think more about her appearance than about God, and she wanted to focus on serving God alone. When Tekakwitha reached the age of twelve, the women of her longhouse began to think about finding a man for her to marry. They even brought a young Iroquois warrior to her one day, thinking he might be the right one, but Tekakwitha did not want to marry and she left the longhouse and hid in the cornfields. Around the same age, Tekakwitha met Catholic missionaries for the first time (Fathers Jacques Frémin, Jean Pierron, and Jacques Bruyas), when they stayed at her uncle s lodge one time. She remembered almost nothing of what her mother had tried to teach her about Jesus in the first years of her life, but now, she listened with interest to what the Black Robes (the Jesuit missionary priests) were saying about Jesus. It was six years later, though, when she was eighteen, that Jesuit priest called Father Jacques de Lamberville taught her much more about Jesus and the Catholic Christian faith and invited her to come to pray at the village chapel. She wanted to be baptized but waited for a while because she did not want to upset her uncle. Tekakwitha was eventually baptized when she was nineteen, on Easter Sunday in She was given a new Christian name: Catherine, pronounced Kateri (Kah-terʹ-ee) in Mohawk. Kateri was named for Saint Catherine of Siena so she tried to be as much like her as she could be. In her longhouse village, Kateri s Christian ways were not accepted very well and Kateri found life difficult. She was teased and given extra chores, and sometimes, not enough to eat. About a year-and-ahalf after her baptism, she left her longhouse village and went north to a Christian Iroquois village near Montreal, called Kahnawake, where she could be a Christian without people criticizing or making fun of her. In the new Christian village, she met other Christian Iroquois women who wanted to give their lives to Jesus and she learned even more about how to live a Christian life. Father Pierre Cholenec, one of the missionaries at this new village, prepared Kateri for her First Communion which she received at Christmastime. She went on the winter hunt that year, but missed participating in the celebration of the Mass and receiving Communion so much that she refused to go on

7 Page 7 of 13 the hunt again in the second year, knowing this would mean she would have no meat to eat over the winter. She desired nothing more than to learn what pleased God the most. Even at Kahnawake, people thought Kateri should marry someone because that was the normal thing for a woman of her age and culture to do, but Kateri believed she was really married to Jesus already and she could not marry anyone else. She and some of her friends formed a small community together and they helped each other to love Jesus more each day. Whenever she gave up things her body wanted, like food, she did it for the sake of Jesus, to share in his sufferings and to express her sorrow for any wrong things she thought she had done, but she sometimes pushed herself with this so much that she became weak. She wanted her spirit to be as free as it could be to love Jesus. Eventually, when Kateri was only twenty-four years old, she got so sick, she could not recover. She lay on a floormat in her longhouse while most of the men and women of the village were out at their hunting camps. Fr. Claude Chauchetière, another priest at Kahnawake, visited her daily during her final illness, convinced there was something very special about her, and that she might be a saint. Fr. Pierre also visited her and gave her the sacraments for the last time. Kateri died on April 17, Her final words were: Jesos Konoronkwa ( Jesus, I love you ). It is said a sweet fragrance filled the room after she died and that the scars on her face disappeared, revealing a very beautiful face. Because of her innocence, purity, faithfulness and love, she is affectionately called the Lily of the Mohawks. What Are Saints? (optional material in square brackets below) Saints are people who love God and try with everything they have to live like Jesus did, showing the goodness and love of God to others. When we see a saint, we see how God s Holy Spirit still lives among us, and how God is making us all as good and holy as Jesus, if we want this, too. We can ask the saints to pray to God on our behalf because we are all a part of the same very big Christian family. The unity we have as believers is shown and brought about primarily when we celebrate the Eucharist together. By the saints example of love, they can help us be more faithful to Christ. Each one of us is called to be as much like Jesus as we can be in our lives. [By canonizing saints, the Church tells Catholic Christians that some of the faithful practised great and heroic virtues and lived their lives in fidelity to the grace of God, and recognizes the power of the Spirit of holiness at work within her (CCC, 828).] How Does a Person Become a Saint in the Roman Catholic Church? When a person lives a life of great virtue, or they are put to death by others because of their faith in Christ, the Church considers whether they should be declared a saint or not. Usually, fifty years have to pass after the death of such a holy person before the Church starts the process. After checking carefully how such a person lived, the Church also looks for signs of their holiness through miracles that may have occurred when someone prayed to them, asking for their help in praying to God about a particular need. Today, the Pope is the only one who can make a saint in the Roman Catholic Church.

8 Page 8 of 13 [Beatification is the first level of the process and this permits a worthy person to receive limited cultus (veneration within perhaps a specific religious order, or in a particular diocese or country). Canonization authorizes liturgical cultus for the whole church (the universal church).] A Miracle Attributed to the Intercession of Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha In 2006, a young boy in the United States developed a high fever and his face swelled after he cut his lip. When doctors assessed the boy, they told his parents Jake Finkbonner had a flesh-eating bacterium called Strep A. Over the next few weeks, the bacterium destroyed his lips, cheeks and forehead and Jake was near death. The family s priest asked for his congregation s prayers and suggested all should ask for the intercession of Blessed Kateri because her facial scars and Native American heritage brought her to his mind. Jake s own heritage was half Native American (Lummi). Prayers from around the world surrounded the boy and a pendant of Kateri was placed on his pillow at the hospital. The infection stopped progressing and the boy recovered. Vatican investigators examined the incident over the course of three years and on December 19, 2011, Pope Benedict XVI approved the miracle, attributing it to Blessed Kateri s intervention. How can we be holy today? We can be holy today by trying to show the love of Jesus Christ for everyone, and by allowing Christ to strengthen us, especially through His many ways of being present to us in the celebration of the Eucharist. Suggested Student Activities and Follow-Up Questions 1. Draw a picture or a series of pictures depicting scenes from Saint Kateri s life story and display it (them) for the class or school to see. For example, you might draw a picture of Kateri in the fields with the other women of her longhouse. When the women of a longhouse went out to the fields to begin planting, they took with them seeds for corn, beans and squash. These vegetables made such a perfect growing combination that they were called the Three Sisters. Because the corn grew tall, it could support the climbing vines which produced beans. The low-growing squash, with its broad leaves, shaded the soil from the sun, preventing weeds from sprouting. 2. Can you think of anyone you know or someone you have heard of who loves Jesus and tries to live like Him (it could be you!)? Draw a picture of that person doing something good or holy. 3. Using an original melody, or a familiar tune (e.g., Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star; Jesus Loves Me; This Little Light of Mine), compose a song about Kateri and sing it with, or for, the class.

9 Page 9 of Write a poem of any kind (e.g., rhyming, free verse, haiku) about Kateri and share it with the class. Haiku is a traditional Japanese form of short poem, often with a theme from nature, which tries to describe something about a real experience or a memory and show the feeling that lies behind the description. In Japanese, haiku has three lines and a total of seventeen syllables (five in the first line, seven in the second line, and five in the last line), or about the number of words you could speak easily in one breath. In English, you can still write haiku in the Japanese style, but it is more important that your haiku be only as long as one breath than that you have exactly seventeen syllables. Make the second line of your haiku a little longer than the other two lines, and use strong images. 5. (Teacher) Find images of smallpox scars on Google Images to show how disfigured Kateri s face may have been. (Students) If you wish, use face paint to draw scars on each other s faces to wear for the day, in solidarity with Saint Kateri. 6. Write a conversation between Tekakwitha (before she was baptized) or Kateri (after she was baptized) and one of the Black Robes (Jesuit missionary priests) she met during her life (Fathers Jacques Frémin, Jean Pierron, and Jacques Bruyas, when they stayed at her longhouse; Father Jacques de Lamberville, when he visited her when she had a foot injury, and invited her to come to the chapel to pray, or at her baptism; Father Pierre Cholenec, when he prepared her for First Communion, or gave her the sacraments for the last time; Father Claude Chauchetière, when he visited her daily as she was dying). 7. Using popsicle sticks, playdough, cardboard or other materials, design and construct a longhouse in Mohawk (Iroquois) style. Once you have constructed your longhouse, place Kateri at work inside (perhaps cooking, doing decorative work with porcupine quills, or keeping the fire going) or outside (perhaps collecting firewood, fetching water, grinding corn, or planting vegetables). The Iroquois called themselves the Haudenosaunee (pronounced ho-dee-no-show-nee), which means people of the longhouse. A longhouse might be six to ten metres in width, and twenty-five to seventy metres in length, in order to accommodate between fifteen and twenty families in a clan. A longhouse is as tall as it is wide. The frame was built with wooden poles made from both mature and young tree trunks lashed together. At the top, these were bent towards the centre and held together with strips of bark. Then, the frame was covered with pieces of bark from elm trees to make a barrier against rain and snow. Supple young tree branches were used to keep the bark in place and pine sap was used to seal any cracks. There was a row of smoke holes in the curved roof, with movable bark sheets, and one or two low doorways (no windows), one at either end, protected by deerskin flaps. A longhouse village was built close to a river or stream so there was plenty of fresh water for drinking and bathing, and easy access to travel routes by water. Inside a longhouse were platforms along the walls, divided by sheets of bark to separate one family s space from another s. There was a three-metre-wide corridor running the

10 Page 10 of 13 length of the longhouse between the platforms on either side. On the floor in this open space were fire pits for preparing food and for keeping warm. Two families shared a fire pit. The people slept on mats made of corn husks and they used bearskins for blankets. They had space under and above the platform to store their belongings including tools, clothing, cooking utensils, weapons, and baskets. Their cooking pots were made of clay and their water and serving bowls were made of wood. The Iroquois used the crossbeams in the longhouse and its rafters for storing dried vegetables, smoked meat, snowshoes and cradleboards (which mothers used to carry babies on their backs). Templates for a longhouse designed by Susan K. Nelson are currently available for free download at A very detailed plan for building an actual or scaled-down version of a longhouse is currently available at (the New York State Museum website). 8. Make a necklace or bracelet from dried seeds and/or beads. Wear it to remind you to tell Jesus you love Him. Soak dried beans, corn kernels, watermelon, sunflower or pumpkin seeds in water to make them soft (some may need to be soaked overnight). Using a needle and a thimble, poke a hole in every seed and let each dry overnight. (You may also paint the seeds before threading them, making sure not to hide the holes you have made in each one, but this will take extra drying time). Then, using a needle and thread or dental floss, design and craft a necklace or wrist or ankle bracelet by stringing the dried seeds onto the thread. Be sure to leave enough extra thread to tie the ends. You will need at least 60 cm for a necklace, 25 cm for a wrist bracelet, and 35 cm for an ankle bracelet. Tying a double knot at one end of the thread will make it easier to keep the seeds on the thread as you string them. Once all the dried seeds are on the thread, remove the needle, and tie the ends of the thread for a finished product. (Purchased beads or small shells may also be used with the seeds for this craft, adding more colour and variety to the design.) 9. Listen to the Huron Carol, a song by Jesuit Father Jean de Brebeuf in Wendat (Huron) and English, currently at a song Kateri Tekakwitha may have sung herself in her own Mohawk language at the Kahnawake mission. Learn the song and sing it in English or another language. 10. Complete the worksheet, using the clues listed. 11. Decorate a cross with porcupine quills (painted round toothpicks). With a black marker, paint the lower one-third of at least 70 round toothpicks black. Let dry. Now paint the upper two-thirds of the round toothpicks with whiteout, and let stand until dry. Using cardboard or poster board, a ruler and pencil, draw a small cross design (perhaps 11 cm x 15 cm). With scissors, cut out the cross and set aside. In the

11 Page 11 of 13 centre of the cross, glue four toothpicks, with points meeting and each perpendicular to its neighbour (+). One quarter of the cross at a time, put down a good base of glue and decorate with the remaining porcupine quills. Toothpicks may be place diagonally, as well as horizontally and vertically, to make an attractive design. Let the cross lay flat to dry overnight. The next day, if you wish, apply a second coat of glue and add sparkles, or a single glass bead at the centre point of the cross if you wish. 12. Prepare a skit about one part of Kateri s life and present it to the class, or plan a tableau and ask the class to guess what part of Kateri s life you are trying to communicate. In a tableau, actors strike a pose, then stay as still as possible and do not speak. 13. Using the clues from the worksheet, or preparing additional questions of your own, organize a Jeopardy-style class competition to answer questions about Saint Kateri s life or miracle(s) and about sainthood in general. 14. Play the Bowl Game Bibliography The Iroquois played a game using six peach stones or large dried beans, painted black on one side and white on the other. The object of the game was to have five of the six peach stones or dried beans showing the white side after the bowl was banged on the ground. Bial, Raymond. The Iroquois. Lifeways. New York: Marshall Cavendish (Benchmark Books), Longhouses. American Community. Toronto: Children s Press (Scholastic, Inc.), Catechism of the Catholic Church. Concacan Inc.: Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, Cunningham, Lawrence. Saints, In The New Dictionary of Theology. Edited by Joseph A. Komonchak, Mary Collins and Dermot A. Lane. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press [Michael Glazier (1987) and the Order of St. Benedict (1990)], Dunn, Mary R. The Mohawk. Indigenous Peoples of North America. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale Thomson Learning, Inc. (Lucent Books), Gaines, Richard M. The Iroquois. Native Americans. Edina, Minn. ABDO Publishing Company, Greer, Allan. Mohawk Saint: Catherine Tekakwitha and the Jesuits. Oxford: University Press, Kalman, Bobbie. Life in a Longhouse Village. Native Nations of North America. St. Catharines, ON: Crabtree Publishing, Lomberg, Michelle. The Iroquois. Canadian Aboriginal Art and Culture. Calgary: Weigl Educational Publishers Ltd., Madigan, Shawn. Saints, Communion of Saints. In The New Dictionary of Catholic Spirituality. Edited by Michael Downey. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press (Michael Glazier and the Order of St. Benedict), 1993,

12 Page 12 of 13 Shoemaker, Nancy. Kateri Tekakwitha s Tortuous Path to Sainthood. In Negotiators of Change: Historical Perspectives on Native American Women. Edited by Nancy Shoemaker. New York: Routledge, 1995, Saint Kateri Lily of the Mohawks Student Worksheet: Fill in the blanks below. 1. Means "Catherine" in Mohawk 2. The clan into which Tekakwitha was born 3. The disease which killed Tekakwitha's family 4. What Tekakwitha sometimes wore over her head 5. Tekakwitha's face was marked with these 6. The Iroquois building in which Tekakwitha lived 7. Tekawitha's very first teacher in her faith 8. The name of one of the first missionary priests Tekakwitha met 9. First name of the priest who prepared Tekakwitha for baptism 10. Age at which Tekakwitha was baptized 11. Sunday on which Tekakwitha was baptized 12. The Three Sisters Tekakwitha helped to plant 13. Something Tekakwitha collected for fuel 14. Something Tekakwitha decorated with beadwork 15. Tekakwitha delayed baptism because of him 16. The day Kateri received her First Communion 17. Kateri loved, and dedicated herself to, Him 18. Sacrifices Kateri made because she was sorry for her sins 19. The Christian village where Kateri went to live after she was baptized 20. The priest who baptized Kateri 21. A Christmas carol Kateri may have sung 22. The priest who prepared Kateri for her First Communion 23. What Kateri missed so much, she refused to go on another winter hunt 24. What Kateri's family pressured her to do when she reached the right age 25. The saint for whom Kateri was named

13 Page 13 of The priest who gave Kateri the sacraments for the last time 27. Kateri's final words before she died at age twenty-four 28. The priest who visited Kateri daily when she was dying 29. Why Kateri is being declared a saint 30. The boy whose face was healed with Blessed Kateri s prayerful help Answers Below: 1. Kateri 2. Turtle 3. Smallpox 4. Blanket 5. Scars 6. Longhouse 7. Mother 8. Fathers Jacques Frémin, Jean Pierron, and Jacques Bruyas 9. Jacques 10. Nineteen 11. Easter 12. Corn, beans, or squash 13. Wood 14. Moccasins and deerskin shirts 15. Uncle 16. Christmas 17. Jesus 18. Penances 19. Kahnawake 20. Fr. Jacques de Lamberville 21. Huron Carol 22. Fr. Pierre Cholenec 23. The Mass, the Eucharist, and daily prayer 24. Marry 25. Saint Catherine of Siena 26. Fr. Pierre Cholenec 27. Jesus, I love you. 28. Fr. Claude Chauchetière 29. Because, above all, she wanted to please God in her life 30. Jake Finkbonner