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Walking in the footsteps of St. Kateri Tekakwitha at historic shrine

July 13, 2023 Catholic News Agency 0
Saint Peter’s Chapel and Native American Museum at Saint Kateri Tekakwitha National Shrine and Historic Site in Fonda, New York. / Photo courtesy of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha National Shrine and Historic Site

Chicago, Ill., Jul 13, 2023 / 12:00 pm (CNA).

Shrines to various saints can be found in every part of the world, including every state in the U.S. Each one is dedicated to faith and prayer, but one shrine in the northeastern United States also has a distinct mission of connecting pilgrims with Native American culture and sharing the fascinating history of Kateri Tekakwitha, the first American Indian to be canonized a saint.

The Saint Kateri Tekakwitha National Shrine and Historic Site in Fonda, New York, honors not only the life of St. Kateri, whose feast day is July 14, but also the life and history of the local Indigenous people to whom she belonged.

“We have cultivated strong ties to both the Catholic Mohawk community and the traditional Mohawk community,” said Melissa Miscevic Bramble, director of operations at the St. Kateri Shrine, in an interview with CNA. “We see it as our mission to educate about her Mohawk culture as well as her Catholic faith.”

Who was St. Kateri?

Called the Lily of the Mohawks, Kateri Tekakwitha was the child of a Mohawk father and a Christian Algonquin mother but was orphaned at age 4 when the rest of her family died of smallpox. Her own early bout with the illness left lasting scars and poor vision.

She went to live with an anti-Christian uncle and aunt, but at age 11 she encountered Jesuit missionaries and recognized their teaching as the beliefs of her beloved mother. Desiring to become a Christian, she began to privately practice Christianity. 

Beginning at about age 13, she experienced pressure from her family to marry, but she wanted to give her life to Jesus instead. A priest who knew her recorded her words: “I have deliberated enough. For a long time, my decision on what I will do has been made. I have consecrated myself entirely to Jesus, son of Mary, I have chosen him for husband, and he alone will take me for wife.”

At last, she was baptized at about age 19, and her baptism made public her beliefs, which had been kept private up until then. The event was the catalyst for her ostracism from her village. Some members of her people believed that her beliefs were sorcery, and she was harassed, stoned, and threatened with torture in her home village.

Tekakwitha fled 200 miles to Kahnawake, a Jesuit mission village for Native Amerian converts to Christianity to live together in community. There, she found her mother’s close friend, Anastasia Tegonhatsiongo, who was a clan matron of a Kahnawake longhouse. Anastasia and other Mohawk women took Kateri under their wings and taught her about Christianity, and she lived there happily for several years until her death around age 23 or 24. 

Although she never took formal vows, Tekakwitha is considered a consecrated virgin, and the United States Association of Consecrated Virgins took her as its patron. She is also the patron saint of traditional ecology, Indigenous peoples, and care for creation.

A shrine with a special mission

The Saint Kateri Tekakwitha National Shrine and Historic Site has a unique mission of archaeological and historical research related to Kateri Tekakwitha and her people. Welcoming several thousand visitors per year, the shrine ministers not only to Christians but also to all American Indians.

According to its website, the shrine and historic site “promotes healing, encourages environmental stewardship, and facilitates peace for all people by offering the natural, cultural, and spiritual resources at this sacred site.” Describing itself as a sacred place of peace and healing with a Catholic identity, its ministry and site are intended to be ecumenical and welcome people of all faiths.

In keeping with this mission, the shrine’s grounds include an archaeological site, the village of Caughnawaga, which is the only fully excavated Iroquois/Haudenosaunee village in the world. St. Kateri lived in this village, which is on the National Register of Historic Places. Visitors can also visit the Kateri Spring, where Kateri Tekakwitha was baptized.

“The water from the Kateri Spring is considered holy water by the Catholic Church,” Bramble said. “People are welcome to come take the waters, and we regularly get reports of healing. We’ve sent that water all over North America to folks who have requested it.”

Besides the archaeological site, the main grounds of the shrine include St. Peter’s Chapel, housed in a former Dutch barn built in 1782; museum exhibits of Native American culture and history; St. Maximilian Kolbe Pavilion; a Candle Chapel dedicated to St. Kateri; Grassmann Hall and the Shrine office; a friary; a gift shop; an outdoor sanctuary; and maintenance facilities. The 150-acre property includes hiking trails that are open to the public year-round from sunrise to sunset. 

Peace Grove at Saint Kateri Tekakwitha Shrine and Historic Site in Fonda, New York. Photo courtesy of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha Shrine and Historic Site
Peace Grove at Saint Kateri Tekakwitha Shrine and Historic Site in Fonda, New York. Photo courtesy of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha Shrine and Historic Site

Outside the Candle Chapel, which is always open for prayer, visitors can participate in a ministry of “Kateri crosses.”

“St. Kateri was known for going into the forest, gathering sticks, binding them into crosses, and then spending hours in prayer in front of crosses she created,” Bramble said. Sticks are gathered from the shrine grounds and visitors are invited to make their own “Kateri crosses” and take them home to use as a prayer aid. Bramble shared that the shrine sends materials for Kateri crosses to those who aren’t able to visit, including recently to a confirmation group.

The feast day weekend

The Saint Kateri Tekakwitha National Shrine has a schedule of special events planned for St. Kateri’s feast day on July 14. Bramble said they anticipate several hundred visitors for the feast day events this year, which include Masses, a healing prayer service, and talks. (A listing of the full schedule can be found here.)

The weekend Masses, which include special blessings and the music of the Akwesasne Mohawk Choir, “incorporate American Indian spiritual practices in keeping with the Catholic Church,” Bramble said. “The Akwesasne Mohawk Choir is made up of descendants of St. Kateri’s community who lived in the area historically.”

Bramble described numerous events each year that partner with the local American Indian community, such as the fun-filled “Three Sisters Festival” in May (celebrating corn, beans, and squash — the “three sisters” that were staples of Native cuisine), healing Masses during Indigenous Peoples’ Week in October, and a recent interfaith prayer service with Mohawk elders.

“There is a reestablished traditional Mohawk community a few miles west of the shrine, and we feel very blessed that we’ve been able to cultivate a very cooperative and mutually respectful relationship with the folks there,” Bramble said.

The Saint Kateri Shrine is also a great place for families. Events often include activities and crafts for children, there is an all-ages scavenger hunt available at the site, and the shrine’s museum is “a phenomenal educational opportunity.”

Bringing together American Indian archaeology and history with the story of St. Kateri, the shrine and its programs shed light on the saint’s story and keep alive the traditions and history of her people.

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Former New Orleans priest gets 25 years on sexual assault and rape charges

July 12, 2023 Catholic News Agency 0
Stephen Sauer was formerly a Jesuit priest in the order’s Central and Southern Province. / New Orleans Television/YouTube April 8, 2019

Boston, Mass., Jul 12, 2023 / 14:15 pm (CNA).

A former Jesuit priest has pleaded guilty to sex crimes committed in and around New Orleans, in which he was charged with drugging and raping 17 adult male victims, many of whom were visiting the popular tourist area. 

Detectives also believe that there are more than 50 victims who remain unidentified.

Stephen Sauer, who reportedly left the Jesuit order by his own request in 2020, was sentenced to 25 years in prison on July 7 in front of a Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, judge. He will have to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life and is barred from contacting 12 of the victims for life. 

The former priest pleaded guilty to 13 counts of sexual battery, nine counts of third-degree rape, 17 counts of video voyeurism, and 16 misdemeanor charges of possessing drugs without prescriptions and possession of drug paraphernalia, the Jefferson Parish District Attorney’s Office said in a statement July 7.

Sauer, 61, would meet his victims in the French Quarter neighborhood of New Orleans, specifically targeting intoxicated men or those who were lost and in need of help. He would drug the men, sometimes by placing narcotics in their drinks at bars.

After some of the victims passed out, Sauer would use an eyedropper to feed the men “sleep-inducing substances,” the district attorney’s statement said. 

He would then take the unconscious men to his home in Metairie and take photos and videos of them, “in various stages of undress,” with his phone, the statement said. 

Then, Sauer would molest some of the men and “pleasured himself,” the statement said. 

Sauer would drive the victims to their hotels or other locations the next morning. The investigation discovered that he shared and traded the images of his victims with others through email.

According to the statement, many of Sauer’s victims were not locals and were separated from friends or lost when Sauer offered to help them.

Sauer’s crimes were committed over two years between 2019 and 2021. 

The former priest’s LinkedIn profile says that he served as the pastor of Immaculate Conception Jesuit Church in New Orleans from 2008–2012. 

CNA inquired of the Archdiocese of New Orleans if Sauer had other positions in the area but was referred to his former Jesuit province. 

Therese Fink Meyerhoff, a spokeswoman for the Jesuits’ Central and Southern Province, confirmed that Sauer served in the province and said: “We learned through media reports that Mr. Sauer pled guilty to charges involving adult men. We encourage any person who has been harmed to notify law enforcement.”

Sauer’s LinkedIn account also says he worked as an assistant professor at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, a Jesuit school, from 2006 to 2008.

Records on the university’s website show that Sauer, who taught theology there, earned his bachelor’s degree at Georgetown University in 1983; his master’s degree at the University of Minnesota in 1991; his bachelor’s of sacred theology degree at Pontificia Università Gregoriana, Rome, in 1997; his licentiate in sacred theology at the Institut Catholique de Paris in 1999; and his doctorate of sacred theology from The Catholic University of America in 2007. 

According to Sauer’s LinkedIn account, he was a faculty member at the Jesuit University of San Francisco from 2013 to 2016; however, his name did not appear in search results on the school’s website.

WDSU6 reported in 2021 that Sauer served as executive director of Arc of Greater New Orleans, a nonprofit organization that serves children with intellectual disabilities, but after his December arrest that year, Sauer was no longer employed by the organization.

Authorities began investigating Sauer in June 2021 after he sent a computer hard drive to be repaired by a company in New York. 

An employee at the company discovered hundreds of images on the hard drive showing that sexual assaults had appeared to have taken place.

Authorities in New York referred the case to the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office after determining the origin of the photos.

Many of the victims were able to be identified by the detectives because Sauer photographed their driver’s licenses and other forms of identification.

When detectives searched Sauer’s home, prescription pill bottles that had the name of a sex offender in Missouri were found. 

Zolpidem, which is known as a “date rape” drug, was found as well, the district attorney’s office said. 

[…]