Daily Gospel Reflection for July 14, 2023

Join us as we reflect, ponder, and pray together inspired by today's Gospel.

There is nothing subtle about today’s Gospel. Is this what God is truly asking of us – to be like sheep among wolves? To know opposition in the face of our faith? For those of us living in relative freedom in the United States, we do not know the anguish of being persecuted for our Christian faith like many of our brothers and sisters throughout the world.

Few of us will understand the sacrifice St. Kateri Tekawitha, whose feast we celebrate today, made in the name of her Catholic faith. St. Kateri lost her parents and little brother during a small pox epidemic; the illness left her disfigured and partially blind. She was adopted by an uncle, a Mohawk chief. Inspired by the local Jesuit missionaries, Kateri would defy the will of her uncle and refuse to marry. At the age of nineteen, she converted on Easter Sunday.

She was treated as little better than a slave. Food was denied to her when she refused to work on Sunday. Her conversion placed her in a perilous position, and she ultimately stole away in the middle of the night to leave her village. She would trek two hundred miles to a Christian indigenous village outside Montreal. For the rest of her short life, she would practice severe fasting in prayer for the conversion of her Mohawk nation.

St. Kateri’s consistent bravery and patient trust in the Lord allowed her to fulfill the call of this Gospel.

Ponder:

What sacrifices am I willing to make for my faith?

Pray:

Tender Jesus, be near those who have sacrificed much to be near to You, like St. Kateri Tekawitha. Strengthen the resolve in those of us who have not been tested, to hold our faith as paramount in our lives.