The Lord Is Within

[Rich]

The Lord Is Within

"You, Lord, were within me, while I was outside. It was there that I
sought you. I rushed headlong upon these things of beauty that you had
made.

You were with me, but I was not with you. They kept me far from you,
those fair things which, if they were not in you, would not exist at
all!"
--St. Augustine--Confessions 10, 27

Prayer: Let me know you, my Father, let me know you as I too am known.
Enter my soul, you who are its strength, and make it what you want, so
that you may have and possess it without stain or wrinkle.
--St. Augustine--Confessions 10, 1

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14 July – Saint Kateri ‘Catherine’ Tekakwitha

 Virgin laywoman, Penitent, Ascetic – known as Lily of the Mohawks –
born in 1656 in the Mohawk village of Osserneon (Auriesville), modern
New York, USA and died on 17 April 1680 at Caughnawaga, Canada of
natural causes. Patronages – ecologists, ecology, environment,
environmentalism, environmentalists, loss of parents, people in exile,
people ridiculed for their piety, Native Americans, Igorots,
Cordilleras,Thomasites, Northern Luzon,[citation needed] Diocese of
Bangued, Vicariate of Tabuk, Vicariate of Bontoc-Lagawe, Diocese of
Baguio, Marikina City, Cainta, Rizal, Antipolo City, Philippines.

Kateri contracted smallpox in an epidemic; her family died and her
face was scarred.  She converted to Roman Catholicism at age 20, when
she was renamed Kateri Catherine, baptised in honour of Saint
Catherine of Siena. Refusing to marry, she left her village and moved
for the remaining five years of her life to the Jesuit mission village
of Kahnawake, south of Montreal in New France, now Canada.

Kateri took a vow of perpetual virginity. Upon her death at the age of
24, witnesses said that minutes later her scars vanished and her face
appeared radiant and beautiful. Known for her virtue of chastity and
mortification of the flesh, as well as being shunned by some of her
tribe for her religious conversion to Catholicism, she is the fourth
Native American to be venerated in the Roman Catholic Church and the
first to be Canonised.

Under the pontificate of St Pope John Paul II, she was Beatified in
1980 and Canonized by Pope Benedict XVI at Saint Peter’s Basilica on
21 October 2012. Many miracles and supernatural events are attributed
to her intercession.

This wonderful crown of new blesseds, God’s bountiful gift to His
Church, is completed by the sweet, frail yet strong figure of a young
woman who died when she was only twenty-four years old –  Kateri
Tekakwitha, the “Lily of the Mohawks”, the Iroquois maiden, who in
17th century North America was the first to renew the marvels of
sanctity of St Scholastica, Saint Gertrude, Saint Catherine of Siena,
Saint Angela Merici and Saint Rose of Lima, preceding, along the path
of Love, her great spiritual sister, Therese of Child Jesus.

She spent her short life partly in what is now the State of New York
and partly in Canada. She was a kind, gentle and hardworking person,
spending her time working, praying, and meditating. At the age of 20
she received Baptism.  Even when following her tribe in the hunting
seasons, she continued her devotions, before a rough cross carved by
herself in the forest. When her family urged her to marry, she replied
very serenely and calmly that she had Jesus as her only spouse. This
decision, in view of the social conditions of women in the Indian
Tribes at the time, exposed Kateri to the risk of living as outcast
and in poverty. It was a bold, unusual and prophetic gesture – on 25
March, 1679, at the age of twenty-three, with the consent of her
spiritual director, Kateri took a vow of perpetual virginity – as far
as we know the first time that this was done among the North American
Indians.

The last months of her life were an ever clearer manifestation of her
solid faith, straight-forward humility, calm resignation and radiant
joy, even in the midst of terrible sufferings. Her last words, simple
and sublime, whispered at the moment of her death, sum up, like a
noble hymn, a life of purest charity – “Jesus, I love you….”.

The Church has declared to the world that Kateri Tekakwitha is a
saint, that she lived a life on earth of exemplary holiness and that
she is now a member in heaven of the Communion of Saints who
continually intercede with the merciful Father on our behalf.
During the Canonisation ceremony on 21 October 2012, Pope Benedict XVI
said in his homily – “Kateri impresses us by the action of grace in
her life in spite of the absence of external help and by the courage
of her vocation, so unusual in her culture. In her, faith and culture
enrich each other! May her example help us to live where we are,
loving Jesus without denying who we are. Saint Kateri, Protectress of
Canada and the first native American saint, we Entrust to you the
renewal of the faith in the first nations and in all of North America!
May God bless the first nations!”

https://anastpaul.com/2019/07/14/


Bible Quote
He that is faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in that
which is greater: and he that is unjust in that which is little, is
unjust also in that which is greater.  (Luke 16:10)

Saint Quote:
The Martyrs desired death, not to fly labor, but to attain their end.
And why did they not fear death, from which man naturally so shrinks?
Because they had vanquished the natural love of their own bodies, by
Divine and supernatural love ... How can man regret to lose that which
he despises? Nay, rather he desires to give his life for God, who is
his life, and to shed his blood for love of the Blood that was shed
for him.
--St. Catherine of Siena


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Prepare to meet the Lord

We must strive to enter the house of our hearts, open the windows, and
notice what is seemly and what unseemly in that house. We must brush
away the cobwebs, sweep the floors, clear out the dust and dirt, strew
the clean floors with freshly-gathered rushes, fragrant herbs, and
sweet-smelling flowers, and paper the walls in bright colors. Then we
must put on festive clothes, prepare a banquet, and rejoice on our way
to meet the Lord with hymns of gladness. If we have been engaged in
servile occupation outside ourselves, that is, engrossed in sin, we
must return to our hearts, as the prophet teaches when he says:
Sinners, return to your hearts.
The spiritual senses are the windows of this house. Through them
divine knowledge shines upon us and illuminates the innermost recesses
of our minds. We must take care to open these windows by constant
mental awareness, to brush away the cobwebs by humbling our pride, to
keep the floors swept by confessing our sins, to strew them with
rushes by doing penance, to paper the walls by training ourselves in
virtue, to wear splendid clothes by performing good works, to prepare
food by reading and meditating upon holy scripture, and to sing psalms
by giving constant praise to God. That is the sort of care we must
take to prepare to meet the Lord, so as to deserve the coming among us
of him who lives and reigns as God for ever and ever. Amen.
--Hugh of Saint Victor