HOMILY SAINT KATERI

This Gospel text can help us find a place in the family of Jesus, in his large community, in his Gospel project. This can be an opportunity but especially an invitation to something greater.

Certainly, Kateri Tekakwitha read this text during her life and felt a call to remain in this large family. Her courage, when she decided to move to Canada despite her family's opposition, her patience amidst her illness, her vow of virginity and chastity, all her subsequent choices resembled a desire to "do the Father's will."

What must have been Kateri's dream? Surely the desire to share the gift of her faith. Today, because of the gift of faith, what meaning, for example, does our promise of chastity have? The same choice was made by Mary, Joseph, Jesus himself, and many other believers in the history of the Church: a consecration to the project of the Kingdom of God, with all its uncertainties and renunciations. How is our desire to share the gift of our faith expressed today? What are our true decisions made in this sense?

We believe that God casts down the mighty from their thrones and lifts up the humble, provided that we follow, for example, the advice of Saint Paul to the Romans and present our bodies, our whole selves, as a living sacrifice. Provided that we can constantly discern what is "the will of God," to put into practice "what is good, what is able to please, what is perfect." Without further explanation, Jesus refers to the people who are called to seek this will. According to Saint Matthew, it concerns his disciples, towards whom "he stretched out his hand," those he looks upon. According to Saint Mark, it concerns the crowd that was around him. The message is sent to all, not only to the initiated, to the disciples, but also to the whole crowd of those who show good will and who have the conditions to discover another will, that of the Father.

God created and loved the first inhabitants of this land of Quebec. With the arrival of the missionaries, many of them showed signs of wanting to fulfill the will of God the Father by receiving baptism. Will we be attentive enough to the need for evangelization today in their areas, in their culture, in the missionary turning of the Church of Quebec?

May Saint Kateri enlighten us by her example and may the Holy Spirit help us discover new paths of evangelization among the peoples of Quebec, for they too are the mother and brothers of Jesus.