St. Katharine Drexel didn’t want to become an ordinary religious sister. She wanted to dedicate her life to the service of minorities in the United States of America.

According to Sister Eleanor McCann, RSM, on the St. Katharine Drexel Shrine website, “Katharine, who was following the plight of the Native groups, saw the injustices they were suffering at the hands of the federal government. She noted, as well, the severe racial injustices and torture of Black people in the South, for whom she grieved.”