02/01/2021
St. Katharine Drexel is the patroness for racial justice, and her feast day is March 3. We, as Catholics, need to seek her intercession for all our sisters and brothers who are wrongfully judged, brutally treated, and cruelly undignified. Ask for her intercession throughout Black History Month. This is St. Katharine's Story.
Drexel weaved together social activism with prayer and trust in God’s providence in a most wonderful way. She overcame many obstacles in the pursuit of justice, exercising her prophetic voice to expose the sin of racism. It was a difficult task, but her missionary zeal fed her desire for justice and equality.
Drexel’s priority for her order was to establish and staff what would be nearly 60 institutions at the service of Indians and blacks throughout the United States. Drexel financed with her own wealth a variety of educational, health care and social service institutions among minority populations — a notable example of which was her assistance to the Servant of God Father Augustus Tolton as he established the first black Catholic parish in Chicago. One of her proudest moments was the 1925 opening of the first college for black Catholics in America, Xavier University in New Orleans
