Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her. The Church honors today the memory of the first native American to be declared ‘Blessed,’ Saint Kateri Tekakwitha. A daughter of a Mohawk warrior, Kateri was born near what is now Auriesville, New York. She was orphaned by an epidemic of smallpox that left her with impaired eyesight and a disfigured face. When she was baptized at the age of twenty, she incurred hostility from her tribe; but she remained faithful and moved to the new Christian colony of Indians in Canada where she dedicated the rest of her life to prayer, penitential practices, and the care of the sick and the aged. She was devoted to the Eucharist and to Jesus Crucified, and was known as the ‘Lily of the Mohawks.’ She died in 1680 at age twenty four and was canonized in October 21 2012 by Pope Benedict XVI. 
Not many people who find themselves in a situation such as Kateri did (orphaned early on in life; left physically impaired and disfigured by a disease; suffering ridicule and ‘rejection’ by one’s own) can find the strength to carry on or to ‘positively’ live their lives. But Kateri did more than find the strength to carry on. She also managed to live a life that effected a change in the lives of others. Whereas it might be that Kateri summoned he strength from deep inside her being, for us who are inspired by her life and who celebrate her as a fellow believer, we can point to her faith as another source of her strength. In the Gospel reading, we hear Jesus reminding Martha that she/he who has found him (Jesus) doesn’t need anything else in life. Like Mary, Kateri had found in her faith everything that she needed. The abuse and ridicule that were directed at her couldn’t dampen her spirit because she had chosen the better part. She couldn’t allow her detractors to take that away from her. She was already blessed.