Today is the Feast of St. Kateri Tekakwitha, the first Native American to be recognized as a saint by the Catholic Church. She is the patroness of ecology and the environment, people in exile and Native Americans. To learn more, Visit the Saint Kateri Conservation Center. And consider making your backyard a Saint Kateri Habitat!
God speaks to man through the visible creation. The material cosmos is so presented to man’s intelligence that he can read there traces of its Creator. Light and darkness, wind and fire, water and earth, the tree and its fruit speak of God and symbolize both his greatness and his nearness. (no. 1147)
Even before revealing himself to man in words of truth, God reveals himself to him through the universal language of creation, the work of his Word, of his wisdom: the order and harmony of the cosmos–which both the child and the scientist discover–“from the greatness and beauty of created things comes a corresponding perception of their Creator,” “for the author of beauty created them.” (no. 2500)