KAHOKIA: A PEOPLE WAITING

I was in St. Louis recently to participate in the Celebrate Jesus 2000, an ecumenical congress sponsored by NARSC, the North American Renewal Service Committee. It was a blessed gathering of over 10,000 people from many different Christian backgrounds. It focused, of course, on Jesus, the source and summit of our salvation.

After the congress ended, I joined with thousands of other Catholic s to celebrate Corpus Christi Sunday, the feast of the Body and Blood of Christ. One of the readings of that liturgy was from St. Paul's letter to the Hebrews. It spoke about the shedding of the blood of the lamb (Jesus) was worth more than the blood of all the bulls, goats, and sheep that had been sacrificed throughout history. It went on to say that Jesus was the perfect high priest, offering Himself, a sinless victim, in reparation for the sins of humanity. It was a reading I had reflected upon often, but I was struck in a new way by the power of that one sacrifice.

After the liturgy was over, I drove across the river from St. Louis to Belleville, Illinois, to checkout something I had heard about years before, a great pyramid rising up out of the Mississippi bottom land. The pyramid, I was told was part of a huge complex of ancient mounds that had been built hundreds of years ago, by a people now long gone.

I have done some archeological exploring in Mexico, Central and South America, but I had never before been to Kahokia, an archaeological sight that is within a 15 minute drive from downtown St. Louis.

It was more than I had expected. The largest mound ( now named monk's mound after Catholic priests who had a garden on the deserted sight) was very similar to the Pyramid of the Sun, which I have visited outside of Mexico city. In fact, the Kahokia pyramid has the largest base of all pyramids, including those of Egypt. It was simply a fantastic sight!

I visited the museum and found out a few interesting facts: At one time, the population at Kahokia was anywhere between 20,000 and 40,000 people. It was the largest city in North America and held that record until Philadelphia reached 30,000 in 1800. The area of the community was bigger than London. In fact, there is still one of the Kahokia mounds in downtown St. Louis to this day!

The community was, at one time, the most influential groupings of people north of Mexico. The society had a hierarchy of religious, social, and military leaders.....There is evidence of human sacrifice. For all of it's greatness, the community had faded into oblivion by the early 13th century. Hundreds of years later, when early European explorers asked local Indians what the mounds were for, no one could give them an answer! The entire civilization had faded, even from memory.

As I left the museum and began to climb the pyramid, I stopped at the second terrace (there are four) to read about a Catholic chapel that had been built on the spot in the 1730's to serve the Illini Indians. I reached the top of the pyramid, and was overwhelmed by the view from the top. Overlooking farm fields and Mississippi flood plains, I could see several different mounds scattered throughout the area. Above the trees, I could see the beautiful skyline of modern St. Louis. It was beautiful.

My watch told me it was three p.m. and as is my habit, I paused for a few moments of prayer to reflect upon the passion and death of Jesus at that hour. It was a very intense prayer time. I found myself thinking about the Kahokia people...the human sacrifice. I thought about the "uselessness' of blood shed, when the perfect priest had offered Himself for all of us, even the people of Kahokia. I thought about St. Paul's observation that "all of creation is longing to see its redemption". I thought about that humble little chapel on the terrace that had been dwarfed by the size of this pyramid. Yet on this pyramid, in that little chapel, there had been a "Human sacrifice"...Jesus, the God-Man making His once and for all offering ever new in the Holy Liturgy. Somehow, I hoped, The Kahokia people found relief and salvation in the offering of Christ.

As I stood up after my prayer, I once again looked out over the landscape and saw St. Louis as a backdrop for the scene. I wondered, how many of us, even in these "modern" times still live lives of futility without Christ. How many of us still use "human sacrifice" (our own efforts, abusing ourselves, hurting others, pushing our lives to insane limits) instead of trusting in the saving action of the one high priest.

I began to walk back down the pyramid, hoping that the Kahokia found peace in Christ...and hoping that we would too.

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