03/02/2026
Sister Theresa Peshlakai, born in the Tsaile, Arizona area in 1907 or 1909, was the first person in her extended family to know how to speak and write English. For them, she served as as a living bridge between Navajo and Anglo societies. Those who knew her described her as being very intelligent and spiritual.
Early on, she went to the schools which were available at the time and ended up graduating from Albuquerque Indian School. Soon, her always frail health took a turn for the worse and she went to the TB Sanitarium at Fort Defiance.
Sister Theresa was a very conscientious person, always intent upon carrying out direction to the letter. Thus, she was very helpful in the TB Sanitarium. She would offer herself as an interpreter for the nurse on behalf of the other Navajo patients, and would even go from ward to ward on Sundays praying with them. Yes, even during her life as a patient her thoughts would turn to God and helping others before herself. Upon leaving the sanatorium, she returned to her home at Black Rock Springs near Tsaile.
Perhaps early on Theresa made a decision not to marry. She did this because, with her frail health she did not have the strength for childbearing and to take care of a family properly. Undoubtedly, with her spiritual bent, she also felt the call to give herself completely to the service of God and others in need.
Sister Peshlakai was a natural born peacemaker and people soon discovered this. Married couples who were experiencing friction between themselves would be attracted to lay and bare their thoughts to her. She would patiently listen to both sides and then might end up saying, "you are both wrong. Go home and pray together and you will find peace."
The community quickly learned to utilize her many talents. During WW2, Navajo parents and grandparents would come to her to write letters for them to their sons who were in service. Naturally, they would also turn to her to translate the letters they would receive back. She did this also for Navajo sons and husbands who were away from home for months at a time working on the railroad.
Chapter officials would also come to Sister Theresa to compose letters for them to the Agency Headquarters. Sometimes, at a chapter meeting, where some urgent matters surfaced and which demanded immediate attention, then shouting would ring out, "Where is Sister Theresa?" and then another cry would rise from someone sitting near a window–"Here she comes in her wagon!" Theresa could always be counted on being wherever she was needed.
She was also there to help people who had no one to stand up for them–namely, the very poor. Also there were the outcasts of navajo society–the children born out of wedlock or children with no parents. Theresa would point out to the families that they are also children of Diyin Ayóó Até'ii–God and should be treated as their high dignity deserves.
Children also loved this woman dearly and seen her as a mother to all. She would gather them together and enthrall them with her stories of Jesus and of the Bible. She was a natural story-teller. Also she helped them in a practical way by mending their torn clothes or perhaps making some little poor girl a Navajo skirt for her birthday. The children would respond by hauling wood and water for her and vying with one another for a chance to just sit on her lap while she told her stories.
There are also stories of Theresa walking all the way from her home to the Tsaile Catholic Church, five miles away, to attend Sunday Mass. Sometimes she would spend a whole week with the Sisters at the Lukachukai Catholic Mission, living and praying with them. She has been aptly described by many as the "First Navajo Sister" a "Saint of the Navajo People."
In her last years, Theresa became crippled with arthritis but never complained. It was her cross, which she accepted willingly. One of her greatest regrets however was no longer being able to write. She would often be found with a rosary or a Bible in her gnarled hands. Toward the end, she would say, "I did my work. Now I want to go to heaven." Her last instruction to her relatives was, "Don't bury me with any jewelery." She died at her niece's home in Navajo, New Mexico on April 11, 1977.
The following day, they had her funeral Mass at St. Michael Mission and she was buried at the St. Michael Cemetery with her much-use rosary in hand.
Sister Theresa Peshlakai was a true servant of Diyin Ayóó Até'ii God. Through her love, sacrifice and compassion she was seen as "Saintable" by the late Father Cormac Antram who documented her extraordinary life.
"I did my work. Now I want to go to heaven."
Sister Theresa Peshlakai (1907-1977), Navajo Catholic catechist of the Chuska Mountains.
Sister Theresa Peshlakai, our elder sister, Pray for us, your Diné people 🙏
