At an event held last September at the parish to honor her canonization, St. Elizabeth students Chelby Burgess (left) and Brittany Carroll raise photos of St. Katherine Drexel with children Catholic New World/Dorothy Perry

Latricia Booker never met St. Katherine Drexel.

Yet Booker, 13, is among the countless number of Chicagoans thankful for the work of Drexel, foundress of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, in championing the cause of education among black and Native American men and women, against the social norms of her day.

“She opened up schools for so many people,” said Booker, an eighth-grader at St. Elizabeth, a place the foundress staffed with her order and made financial investments in over 90 years ago.

At that time, St. Elizabeth was known as St. Monica, the mother school and church for black Catholics in Chicago. Its pastor was Father Augustus Tolton, the first recognized black priest in the United States.

On March 3, Booker joined current St. Elizabeth classmates, students of St. Monica, graduates of Xavier University in Louisiana, which Drexel founded in 1915, Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament and Catholics throughout the Midwest in celebration of her first feast day as a saint.

Last October, Pope John Paul II canonized Drexel as the second U.S.-born saint.

At a Mass held at St. Thomas the Apostle in Hyde Park, celebrated by Bishop Joseph N. Perry, along with local and visiting priests of the Divine Word, St. Katherine Drexel was remembered for her work to improve the local church.

Petitions honoring her contributions to the universal church were read in Laguna; a Native American language; Igbo, a Nigerian tongue; Haitian; Gaelic; and English.

St. Josephine Bakhita was also acknowledged for her witness that speaks to the lives of Catholics of the African Diaspora.

During a program within the Mass, Booker portrayed St. Katherine.

She described the experience as “inspiring.” Said Booker, “St. Elizabeth means everything to me. Being here has brought me closer to God.”

For that, Booker said she is thankful for the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament and their saint of a foundress.