August 13, 2024 // Perspective

St. Katharina Kasper: A Model of Patience

Michael Heinlein

God’s timing is a mystery. Waiting for God’s plan to be made clear can be difficult. It can test our faith and trust, make us question our hope, distract us from doing God’s will as it presents itself to us in the day-to-day circumstances of our lives.

St. Maria Katharina Kasper experienced this kind of waiting quite dramatically in her life. But, as much as God’s timing is a mystery, by God’s grace, we can begin to see His providence in our exercise of patience – as St. Katharina’s story makes clear. “Be still before the Lord; wait for Him” (Ps 37:7), according to the psalmist’s wisdom. “All things work for good for those who love God,” as St. Paul instructs.

From her youth in Germany, Katharina was drawn to consecrating her life to God. But, a confluence of circumstances in her life made realizing her vocation particularly challenging. Two specific factors that made it so: rising secularism in 18th-century Germany and a related decline of fervent faith in her locale.

Katharina’s long-held determination to offer herself to God in religious life was assuredly countercultural. The rising tide of anti-religious sentiment throughout much of Western Europe following the French Revolution was taking its toll on ecclesial life in Katharina’s formative years. And this reality made Katharina’s vocation both mysterious and impractical. It’s a mystery of God’s providence that she was drawn to religious life, as there were no nuns or convents in her area. In fact, neither she nor her parents had even met a sister. And, practically speaking, Katharina had no one to whom she could turn for counsel in connecting with a community of religious women. Her meager circumstances and the diminished ecclesial life of her place and time meant it would take time for her to make a full fiat as the Lord’s handmaid.

The waiting had its purpose though. As Katharina waited patiently for the circumstances of her life to be amenable to life as a consecrated woman, God’s providence was preparing her for her fiat. Making regular visits to a Marian shrine near home, Katharina was able to pour her heart out to Mary and learn from her what is required to make a wholehearted fiat. And, as she waited, she lost her father and most of his property. This provided the opportunity for Katharina to learn to love more fully, more sacrificially, by working hard to provide for her widowed, difficult mother when no one else seemed willing to take her in.

Eventually, the way to consecrated life was made clear for Katharina, via the often meandering paths God opens for those who remain faithful to Him. And more, not only would she make the vows of a nun, but God saw to it that this woman who came from a region with no convents would be foundress of a congregation and establish convents throughout Germany and the world.

God’s timing in Katharina’s life was a gift for the Catholics in the nascent Diocese of Fort Wayne. For the many German immigrants here, Katharina’s order, the Poor Handmaids of Jesus Christ, would be sent to Fort Wayne to establish its first hospital. God’s timing meant that Katharina’s zeal for consecrated life and service to God’s people after the example of Mary would become a means for evangelical reform in the Church and a force for its expansion.

Thanks to Katharina’s patience and perseverance, God made a way for her to make an oblation of her life for His glory and the service of His people. She walked among us in the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, not in the flesh, but in the sisters of the congregation she founded and formed, some of whom played a significant ministerial role in our diocese since its earliest days. After her canonization in 2018,  Bishop Rhoades saw it fitting to petition the Holy See to include Katharina’s feast on our diocesan liturgical calendar. Approval was given in 2020, inscribing an optional memorial on February 1.

Michael R. Heinlein is author of “Glorifying Christ: The Life of Cardinal Francis E. George, O.M.I.” and a promised member of the Association of Pauline Cooperators.