Katherine Drexel

                         Katherine Drexel

     Katherine Drexel was born in Philadelphia in 1858.  She came from one of the wealthiest families in America.  Her father was a prominent and an extremely successful banker, a Catholic of Austrian descent.  Katherine did not know her mother, who died five weeks after her birth.  But a year later her father remarried to another Catholic, Emma Bouvier, a member of an equally prominent Philadelphia family, who exerted a strong influence on Katherine and her two sisters.  Emma was a devout Catholic and would have profound influence on the spiritual growth and piety of her stepdaughter.  Emma encouraged Katherine to live a life of dedication and service to the poor.

     Katherine's early education was both religious and secular.  Her father, who was one of the wealthiest Catholics in American at that time, employed the best of tutors to teach his daughters Latin, French, and music in addition to doctrines of the Catholic faith.

     The bond between Katherine and her stepmother continued to grow.  They worked together to aid the less fortunate members of their community.  When the Drexels were in the city, they opened their homes twice a week to scores of people who came seeking food, clothes, coal, and money to pay the rent.  They also hired what would later be called a social worker to follow up on the neediest cases.  Indeed the Drexels reportedly spent more than $20,000 a year on those who came to their home seeking assistance.

     When Katherine was 15, the Drexel family spent a long vacation touring the shrines of Europe.  The grand tour included a private meeting with the Pope and a visit to the shrine at Lourdes as well as time spent in London and Paris.

     Kate made her social debut in Philadelphia in 1879, but her stepmother contracted cancer a short time later.  Kate nursed her for the final three years of her life, and came to realize that not even Drexel's immense fortune could do anything to prevent Emma's death.

     It was during this time that the family became concerned about the plight of Native Americans.  When a family friend (and Katharine's spiritual director) Bishop James O'Connor of Omaha, Neb., told the Drexels of the horrible conditions that existed on Native American reservations in his dioceses, the family began to support his work with their prayers and financial contributions. 

     At this point Katherine realized that it was not enough to share her wealth.  God was calling her to give up everything.  Kate began to consider a religious vocation.

     Katharine started thinking about entering a convent.  Her consideration was prompted by two life-changing events; first, the death of her stepmother, and then the death of her father.

     When her father, Francis Drexel, died in 1885, the high powered banker left behind a $15.5 million estate that was to be divided among his three daughters--Elizabeth, Katherine and Louise.  About $15.5 million went to several charities, leaving the girls to share in the income produced by $14 million--about $1,000 a day for each woman. 

     About this time Katherine began to realize that it was not enough for her to share her wealth.  God was calling her to give up everything.  Kate began to consider a religious vocation.

     Consequently she embarked on a long search to find a religious order corresponding to her own sense of mission.  But when none could be found, she received the support of her bishop to establish her own religious congregation.  In 1891 she was professed as the first member of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament for Indians and Colored People.  Within the year ten other women had joined her order.

     Though Katherine embraced a vow of personal poverty, she continued to administer the income from her trust--the enormous sum of $400,000 a year.  She might well have spent the money to endow the establishment of her own congregation, but she insisted that her own Sisters rely on alms.  The money would continue to be used to support other projects of service to Indians and blacks. 

Among her gifts, over time, were a total of a million dollars to the Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions and $100,000 a year to the support of mission schools on the reservations.  In the 1920's she contributed $75,000 toward the founding of Xavier University in New Orleans, the first Catholic college established for blacks.  All told she was personally responsible for establishing 145 Catholic missions and 12 schools for Indians, and 50 schools for black students.

     Even though she was raised in opulence, Blessed Katharine took seriously her vow of poverty.  She used pencils until they were nubs, wrote return correspondence on the blank side of the letters she received and opened up the flaps of envelopes for notepaper.  When her shoelaces snapped, she sewed them back together rather than buy a new pair.  She frequently encountered the ire of train conductors on her many visits to her schools and missions because she spent as much time as possible in the day coach, which was a cheaper fare, before retiring for a few hours in the sleeper car.  The savings were used to increase her tips to the black reporters.

     After surviving a heart attack in 1935, Blessed Katharine refused to purchase a wheel chair, instead, she was reluctantly persuaded to allow workmen affix wheels on a wooden chair from the motherhouse's auditorium.

     Her charitable ways so impressed Congress in the 1920s that she successfully lobbied for an amendment to the federal tax code that would allow an organization that gave at least 90 percent of its income to charity an exemption from income taxes.  The law became known as "The Philadelphia Nun Loophole."

     There were plenty of claims on the generosity of a young Catholic heiress.  But Katherine Drexel's concern extended to those outside the church, indeed to those all but excluded from American

society--namely Indians and blacks.  She began by endowing scores of schools on Indian reservations across the country.  In 1878 during a private audience with Pope Leo XIII she begged the pope to send missionary priests to serve the Indians.

     In 1883 during a visit with Pope Leo XIII she asked him to send a missionary for the "Indians and Colored people."  The pope replied, Daughter, why don't you become a missionary?"  She left in tears.

     Upon her return home she consulted with her spiritual director, Bishop James O'Connor of Omaha, about entering a cloistered community.  The Bishop insisted on Katherine establishing her own community.  If she entered a community demanding a vow of poverty and someone else controlled her money, it might not continue to be used for the Indians and blacks.

     In the fall of 1886, Katherine, her older sister Elizabeth, and her half-sister, Louise, decided to take a trip to Europe.  By winter, they had reached Rome.  And, unknown to her sisters, Katherine now sought out the Pope, requesting spiritual advice.  At this meeting, Katherine's suspicion was confirmed when the Pope himself suggested she enter Religious life.    On her return home, Drexel decided to visit her friend Bishop O'Connor and see what missionary work was all about.  She also made several trips to reservations, talking with scores of Religious and tribal leaders.  Katherine came to understand firsthand the enormous poverty and illiteracy among nearly every tribe in the West.

     In January 1887, Pope Leo XIII had a private audience with a wealthy heiress from Philadelphia, 29-year-old Katherine Drexel.  She was concerned about the spiritual needs of African and Native Americans.  She asked the Pope to recommend a Religious Order to which she could give her substantial inheritance on the condition that the money be used to provide for the needs of these overlooked minorities.  She also asked why so few priests and Sisters were working in this area of ministry.

     "Why don't you become a missionary yourself?" the Pope asked.

     And that is how Katharine Drexel began her impressive career of service to disadvantaged Americans.

     The Drexel family, meanwhile, continued its generous support by underwriting the construction of new schools and chapels and providing funds for better housing.  Along with her friends, Katherine sought the aid of Congress and the Office of Indian Affairs.  During these months, she pondered as well the Pope's words.  And she continued to seek the advice of her spiritual Director.

     Finally, in the spring of 1889, O'Connor felt Drexel was ready to establish her own community.  "If you join an existing Community," he told Katherine, "you may be assigned to other work, and that must not happen."

     That year, Katherine Drexel entered the Sisters of Mercy novitiate in Pittsburgh.  By retaining control of her inheritance, she was able to send money where it was most needed to continue the work of the Catholic missions even while training for Religious life.

     In fact, during her novitiate, Drexel was responsible for the establishment of seven new missions.  Though she had spent her early years in luxury, she grew to love the Religious life.

     In 1891, Katherine Drexel founded the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament for Indians and Negroes.  In addition to her vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, she promised to be "the mother and servant of the Indians and colored races."  For the rest of her life, she remained faithful to that vow.

     Following the ceremony, she was appointed the first superior of the new Order.  She and twelve postulants and novices took up residence in the old Drexel summerhouse in the town of Torresdale while a new residence was being prepared for them in Cornwells Heights, Pa.

     Not everyone was enthusiastic about the new community.   There was, for instance, some opposition to building the convent and neighboring boarding schools for black children in the upscale community of Cornwells Heights;  On the day of the cornerstone ceremony, a stick of dynamite was found nearby.  With police protection, the ceremony was held without incident.

     And the order never-the-less attracted many new members.

raced a vow of personal poverty, she continued to administer the income from her trust--the enormous sum of $400,000 a year.  She might have spent the money to endow the establishments of her own congregation, but she insisted that her own Sisters rely on alms.  The money would continue to be used to support other projects of service to Indians and blacks.  Among her gifts, over time, were a total of a million dollars to the Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions and $100,000 a year to the support of mission schools on the reservations.  In the 1920s she contributed $750,000 toward the founding of Xavier University in New Orleans, the first Catholic College established for blacks.  All told she was personally responsible for establishing 145 Catholic missions and 12 schools for Indians, and 50 schools for black students.

     One of her greatest triumphs was in establishing Xavier University in New Orleans, the only Catholic university for blacks in America.

     Mother Drexel died on March 3, 1955, at the age of ninety-six, her life having spanned the era of slavery and the Indian wars to the dawn of the modern civil rights movement.  It was a period in which Blacks and Indians, the communities to which Mother Drexel devoted her life, were far from the consciousness of most American Catholics.  Her charitable works did little directly to challenge the structures of racism and discrimination.  But in the era of rigidly enforced racial segregation her work had a profound "witness value." 

     Katherine Drexel was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 1988.

Drexel was born in Philadelphia in 1858. the daughter of a prominent and successful banker, Francis Anthony Drexel. and Hannah Longstroth Drexel, who died when Katherine was an infant.  Two years later, Katherine's father married Emma Bouvier, a member of an equally prominent Philadelphia family.  Emma, a devout Catholic would have profound influence on the spiritual growth and piety of her stepdaughter.  In fact, she encouraged Katharine to live a life of dedication and service to the poor.

     Katharine's early education was both religious and secular.  Her father, who was one of the wealthiest Catholics in

America at that time, employed the best of tutors to teach his daughters Latin, French, and music in addition to doctrines of the faith.

     When her father, Francis Drexel , did in 1885, the high powdered banker left behind a $15.5 million estate that was to be divided among his three daughters--Elizabeth, Katherine and Louise.  About $15.5 million went to several charities, leaving the girls to share in the income produced by $14 million--about $1,000 a day for each woman.

     The latter event, in particular,  (death of father)

     Mother Drexel often spoke to newspaper and leading educators about the wide spread prejudice against the people her Community served.  She complained to the editors that in crime stories where the criminal was black, that fact was always  highlighted in headlines.  In a talk to the faculty and students at Notre Dame, she pointed out that only two Catholic colleges in Indiana admitted African Americans as students.  Her words helped to educate people and relieve racial tensions man years before the start of the civil rights movement in America.

     But perhaps Drexel's greatest achievement of all was the founding, in 1915, of Xavier University in New Orleans.  Mother Drexel worked hard to raise the funds and begin construction of the first Catholic college for black students, in spite of a lack of support from many U.S. bishops.

     During the Depression, Mother Drexel began to take a still more active role in the fight for social justice, supporting legislation to improve the lives of African and Native American.  A special concern for her was an anti-lynching bill before Congress in 1934.  She urged her Sisters and workers to write to their legislators to support the bill and was disappointed when the progressive legislation was defeated due to Southern opposition.

     Through it all, Mother Drexel was constantly on the go.  She made an annual to every convent in her Order, taking an active interest in the work of each one.  But while leaving Chicago in 1935 on yet another such pilgrimage, Drexel suffered a heart attack.   *** The following year, while attending a party in her honor, Drexel suffered another heart attack.  After a hospital stay, she was permanently confined to a wheelchair and the motherhouse.

Though confined, Drexel continued to direct her Congregation, handling most of the work by mail and telephone.  In 1937, she even supervised the construction of a new library at Xavier University.  She was, however, unable to attend its dedication.  That same year, U.S. Catholic bishops meeting in Washington gave Mother Drexel a citation for her "untiring efforts in behalf of the Indian and the colored, to whose welfare she has dedicated her fortune, her name, her life."  And for her efforts on behalf of the equality among races, the Catholic University awarded Drexel a doctorate, the first honorary degree ever awarded by the university to a woman.

* * *  Mother Drexel continued to receive honorary degrees and special citations of all kinds long after long after * * *  She on the other hand spent much of these last days in prayer.

     On March 3, 1955, surrounded by her beloved Sisters, Mother Drexel breathed her last.  She was 96 years old.  As a tribute to her passion for equality among the races, two white pallbearers, two blacks and two Native Americans were selected to carry her coffin.

     It is estimated that Katherine Drexel spent more than $15 million on charitable works in her lifetime.

     On November 20, 1988, Pope John Paul II beatified Mother Katherine Drexel.  The prayer written for the Mass on her feast day asks God to "enable us to work for justice among the poor and oppressed and keep us undivided in love in the Eucharistic community of Your Church,"  Social justice is the unmistakable example Drexel left for all of us.

     Her foundation, known as Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament for Indians and Colored People, but now officially called Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, was canonically founded on February 12, 1891.  Because of her substantial holdings a reconciliation with the vow of poverty was necessary.  Archbishop Patrick J. Ryan of Philadelphia settled the issue and informed Katherine, "You retain the possession and the administration, but you have to promise in case of my requiring it, that you would renounce your possessions."

    

     When she died in 1955, at the age of ninety-seven, she left a great legacy of solid accomplishments.  As mother general, she founded forty-nine convents for her sisters, set up training courses for catechists and teacher, and built sixty-two schools and Xavier University.

     The cause for her beautification and canonization was opened in 1964 by John Cardinal Krol, archbishop of Philadelphia, and her writings were approved by the Congregation of the Causes of the Saints on November 9, 1973.  The results of that preliminary searching inquiry were sent to Rome, and Pope John Paul II officially introduced the cause of this holy woman (the officially introduction of the apostolic process) on November 17, 1979.  She was beautified by Pope John Paul II on November 20, 1988, and her feast day is March 3.