Life and Religious Work
Katharine Mary Drexel was born Catherine Marie Drexel in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on November 26, 1858, to Francis Anthony Drexel and Hannah Langstroth. Her family owned a considerable banking fortune, and her uncle Anthony Joseph Drexel was the founder of Drexel University in Philadelphia. She had two natural sisters, Louise and Elizabeth. She was a distant cousin of former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis on her father's side.
She took religious vows, and took the name Mother Katharine, dedicating herself and her inheritance to the needs of oppressed Native Americans and African-Americans in the western and southwestern United States, and was a vocal advocate of racial tolerance. Joined by 13 other women, she then established a religious congregation, the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament to further this cause. She also financed more than 60 missions and schools around the United States, as well as the founding of Xavier University of Louisiana – the only historically Black, Roman Catholic university in the United States.
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