{"id":1013,"date":"2018-04-17T15:10:04","date_gmt":"2018-04-17T15:10:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/?p=1013"},"modified":"2018-04-17T15:10:04","modified_gmt":"2018-04-17T15:10:04","slug":"homily-easter-week-03-02-memorial-st-kateri-tekakwitha","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/2018\/04\/17\/homily-easter-week-03-02-memorial-st-kateri-tekakwitha\/","title":{"rendered":"HOMILY EASTER WEEK 03 02: MEMORIAL – ST KATERI TEKAKWITHA"},"content":{"rendered":"

Living Without Blinders \u2013 Memorial: St Kateri Tekakwitha<\/em><\/p>\n

(Acts 7:51-8:1a; Ps 31; Jn 6:30-35)<\/p>\n

**************************************************<\/p>\n

Caroline, a friend whom I have known for years, shared something with me recently I did not know and had not noticed about her – she has been living without sight in her left eye since being hit by an elastic at the age of eleven. I was shocked to hear how that has affected her vision and life \u2013 often bumping into people she does not notice on that side of the sidewalk as she walks along.<\/p>\n

This incident reminded me of the blinders put on horses to minimize the distractions while they are cantering along a road. These blinders also helped avoid them being spooked. This, however, led to a very narrow vision for them, as being blind in one eye did for Caroline.<\/p>\n

Today the readings show us two roads on which to travel: one with blinders on, and one without. We are invited to live without blinders as we travel our journey of faith.<\/p>\n

The road with blinders is so obvious in both readings, in Stephen\u2019s encounter with the unbelieving Jews and Jesus\u2019 encounter with the people after the miracle of the loaves.<\/p>\n

On the road with blinders, there is a focus on the physical, on material bread, stubbornness, opposition to the Spirit, persecution and killing of the prophets who foretold the coming of Jesus, the righteous one. \u00a0Stephen accuses the Jewish council and their associates of being uncircumcised in heart and ears. That means they are not open to and will resist anything new. On top of that, he claims they had the law, but did not keep it. They had lost the spirit of the law and had reduced it to rules and regulations about external observances that did not touch the heart or challenge anyone to change. Their reaction to Stephen was blind rage and a refusal to listen to him or to change. To preserve their closed system, they had to get rid of Stephen so they stoned him as they had crucified Jesus.<\/p>\n

Before judging these people too harshly, however, we need to remind ourselves the same situation exists today, evident especially in religious leaders who know the scriptures and the tenants of their faith yet can also be pedophiles and caught in a consumer lifestyle.<\/p>\n

Less dramatically, there are many examples around us of even wealthy, successful and famous people whose lives are still empty, somehow still missing something. St. Augustine is right when he stated our hearts are restless until they rest in God. Ron Rolheiser wrote his most well-known book about this, entitled The Holy Longing.<\/em><\/p>\n

On the road without blinders, it is just the opposite: faith in Jesus; faith in the Trinity as Father, Jesus and the Spirit, trust in Jesus as the Bread of Life that alone truly satisfies the deepest yearnings of the human heart, and the courage to witness to that truth, even at the cost of one\u2019s life. Think of all the Christians persecuted around the world today, to the point where some claim there are more martyrs today than ever before in history.<\/p>\n

Although not a martyr, today we honor someone who lived on the road without blinders \u2013 St. Kateri Tekakwitha. The first North American Indigenous woman to be canonized, Kateri is often called the Lily of the Mohawks. She was born in 1656, on the southern bank of the Mohawk River at Osserneon (Auriesville, NY). Her mother was a Christian Algonquin from Trois-Rivi\u00e8res, Quebec, and her father a non-Christian Mohawk Turtle clan chief. When Kateri was four years old, a small pox epidemic killed her parents and her brother, leaving her with seriously impaired eyesight and a disfigured face. What she could not see with her physical eyes, she saw with the eyes of her soul into the mysteries of her faith.<\/p>\n

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St Kateri Tekakwitha<\/p><\/div>\n

Inspired by Jesuit missionaries from an early age, Tekakwitha was baptized on Easter Sunday 1676 and assumed the name Kateri, likely in honor of Saint Catherin of Sienna. The following year, due to persecution in her community, Kateri escaped to Kahnawake on the St Lawrence River opposite Tiohtiake (Montreal). She had a strong devotion to the Eucharist, a deep concern for others and spent hours praying in the woods. She died on April 17, 1680 and was canonized in 2012. Those present at her death witnessed her scarred face being miraculously healed and transformed into her original beauty.\u00a0Kateri is patron saint of ecology, those who have lost their parents, and World Youth Day.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The Eucharist is, for those who have faith and eyes to see, a sharing in Jesus as the Bread of Life, the food of martyrs. May it help to satisfy our holy longing and empower us to go out and be bread for the world ourselves.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Living Without Blinders \u2013 Memorial: St Kateri Tekakwitha (Acts 7:51-8:1a; Ps 31; Jn 6:30-35) ************************************************** Caroline, a friend whom I have known for years, shared something with me recently I did not know and had not noticed about her – she has been living without sight in her left eye since being hit by an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-easter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1013"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1013\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1018,"href":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1013\/revisions\/1018"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/archbishopsylvainlavoie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}