(C.D. Stampley Enterprises, Charlotte, NC 2001). Used with permission.

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florists

St. Therese of Lisieux (1873-1897)

Feast day: October 1

Florists have as their patron St. Therese of Lisieux, popularly known as “the Little Flower.” As she was dying of tuberculosis Therese promised, “I will spend my Heaven doing good on earth.” Then she added that the graces she won for anyone who prayed to her would cascade to earth like a shower of roses.

The day her sister Pauline entered Lisieux’s Carmelite cloister nine-year-old Therese Martin could not stop crying. Their mother Azelie-Marie Guerin Martin had died five years earlier of breast cancer. Pauline, the second eldest of the five Martin girls and fourteen years older than Therese, had stepped in to become her little sister’s mother. Now she was leaving, too. “I was going to lose my mother all over again,” Therese said. “I can’t tell you what misery I went through at that moment.”

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Therese’ solution to this wretched situation was to announce that she had a vocation to Carmel. Pauline humored her sister (the Martins always humored Therese) and took her to see the prioress, Mother Marie de Gonzague. Because she was still a child Therese was permitted inside the grill to speak the prioress privately in the convent parlor. To her credit Mother Marie de Gonzague treated Therese seriously, but she told the child she could not accept a nine-year-old girl as a postulant. Therese would have to wait until she was sixteen to enter—on this point the prioress was firm. For the next six years Therese Martin devised one scheme after another how to enter the Carmel early and speed up her reunion with Pauline.

The Martin household in which Therese was born on January 2, 1873, resembled a cloister in some respects. The family was tightly knit; they did not mix much with anyone outside their circle of relatives. The parents, Louis and Zelie, were intensely pious: both had tried unsuccessfully to enter the religious life. On their wedding night Louis suggested that they commit themselves to a Josephite marriage—living together as brother and sister without ever making love, in imitation of the Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph. Now Zelie was as religious as her new husband but she wanted a large family. No one knows what she said to Louis but over the next thirteen years Zelie gave birth to nine children, five of whom—all girls—survived to adulthood: Marie, Pauline, Leonie, Celine, and Therese.

Under Zelie’s over-zealous direction the five Martin sisters were encouraged to incorporate into their lives regular periods of prayer, a regimen of self-sacrifice, and a consciousness of personal faults. The one rebel was Leonie. Although genuinely as religious as anyone in the family, she resisted her mother’s attempts to mold her devotional life. To make her conscious of her failings Zelie gave Leonie pieces of cork: every time she caught herself committing some fault she was to put a piece of cork in a special drawer. Leonie refused, and poor Zelie feared her rebellious daughter might be on the path to damnation.

Both Martins were self-employed. Zelie did a thriving business making Alencon lace. Louis was a clockmaker. In 1871 Louis sold his company. The money he received from the sale of his business coupled with an inheritance and the income from Zelie’s business enabled Louis to live in comfortable retirement with his family. When Zelie died in 1878 Louis found comfort in his daughters, especially Therese whom he called his “little queen.” They went for long walks in the afternoon to visit the churches of Lisieux, then on the way home Louis bought Therese some little treat. Father and daughter were nearly inseparable.

It is no surprise given the intense piety of the Martin family that one by one the sisters entered the convent. Pauline went first to the Carmel. Marie followed her there. Leonie tried to strike out on her own by entering the convent of the Poor Clares but she proved unsuited to it and was sent home after two months. Therese described her return: “We saw those blue eyes of her again often wet with tears.” On Pentecost Sunday the year Therese was fourteen she followed her father out to the garden to tell him she wanted to enter the Carmel like her sisters. Louis wept and tried to convince himself that God was bestowing a singular grace on him by taking his daughters one by one.

Therese was determined to enter the Lisieux Carmel early. Louis took her first to see the superior of Carmelite men but it the interview was not a success: Therese’s request irritated him. He told her to wait until she was sixteen. Next Louis made an appointment with the bishop of Bayeux. He listened sympathetically to Therese but in the end the bishop also told her to wait. In her disappointment Therese wept so hard the bishop took her in his arms to comfort her.

Louis believed Therese needed some distraction. Father Reverony, a priest the Martins were acquainted with, was leading a pilgrimage to Rome. Louis decided he, Therese, and Celine would join it. The climax of the tour was attending {ln:Pope} Leo XIII’s Mass in his private chapel in the Vatican followed by an opportunity for each pilgrim to kneel individually before the Holy Father to receive his blessing. By this point in the pilgrimage Father Reverony had a good idea what type of girl he was dealing with in Therese, so he gave strict instructions that no one was to address the {ln:Pope} . Nonetheless when her turn came Therese asked {ln:Pope} Leo to let her enter the Carmel a year early. The {ln:Pope} gave Father Reverony a quizzical look, but the priest assured the Holy Father the bishop of Bayeux was looking into the matter. “Very well, my child,” Leo said, “do as your superiors tell you.”

Therese was not put off so easily. She grabbed the {ln:Pope} ’s knees and said, “But if you would say the word, Most Holy Father, everyone would agree.”

Very gently {ln:Pope} Leo gave a non-committal answer, “All is well. If God wants you to enter, you will.” Therese was about to press her point, and Celine was chiming in, when the papal guards and Father Reverony physically lifted Therese to her feet and all but carried her out of the chapel.

Back home in Lisieux Therese waited for word from the bishop. It arrived on New Year’s Day—he granted her permission to enter the Carmel a year early. The prioress, Mother Marie de Gonzague, however would not admit Therese until Easter.

On April 9, 1888, Therese with all her family went to Mass at the Carmel church. Afterward she and Louis bid each other a tearful good-bye. Then she walked through the door in the grill where her sisters Marie and Pauline were waiting for her with Mother Marie de Gonzague and the rest of the sisters.

In many respects Therese was prepared for the rigorous life of a Carmelite. She had already developed a profound relationship with God. On the other hand she was still a 15-year-old girl and the routine of prayer, work, and silence certainly clashed with her adolescent impulses. She admitted that initially she found “more thorns than roses” in the Carmel. In her father’s house she had never washed clothes, scrubbed floors, or performed any other housekeeping chores. As a postulant she was expected to do all these things—and she was very bad them. It was humiliating for Therese to be so clumsy at tasks others found simple.

At home she had been indulged and in the Carmel Marie and Pauline still tried to spoil her. They even went so far as to appeal to the prioress for dispensations from some of the more rigorous elements of the rule for their baby sister. (During winter, when the other nuns wore sandals, the Martin sisters wanted the prioress to give Therese permission to wear fur-lined boots.)

Then word came to Marie, Pauline, and Therese that Louis had suffered a stroke, the first of several that would slowly rob him of his mobility and his mind. When he died in 1894, Celine joined her sisters in the Carmel.

In the early hours of Good Friday 1896, as she lay in bed, Therese felt her mouth fill up with blood. It was the first sign that she had contracted tuberculosis. The Carmelite rule requires nuns to inform the superior whenever they are ill. Therese told Mother Marie de Gonzague what happened in the night but assured the prioress she was in no pain and wanted to keep the Good Friday fast. Mother Marie gave her consent. For the next year, as her condition became worse, Therese never requested nor did Mother Marie offer to mitigate the severity of Carmelite life. But by spring 1897 it was obvious that Therese was dying.

Therese had an excruciating death. Mother Marie de Gonzague would not permit the doctors to use morphine to ease the patient’s pain. In addition Therese struggled with a dark night of the soul that at times she felt certain would crushed her faith entirely. By God’s grace she did not succumb to despair, but tuberculosis kept her in perpetual agony. “What is the good of writing beautifully about suffering,” she said. “It means nothing, nothing!” On another occasion when she felt she was suffocating she gasped out an appeal to the Blessed Mother. “Holy Virgin,” she said, “I can get no earthly air!”

The end came after seven in the evening of September 30. As her three sisters and the rest of the community knelt around her bed reciting the prayers for the dying, Therese looked at her crucifix and said, “O, I love him! My God, I love you!” A moment later she was dead. Therese Martin was 24 years old.

In the Lisieux Carmel Therese had written a memoir of her life. Now Mother Marie de Gonzague decided to have the manuscript published. In 1898 it appeared under the title The Story of a Soul and by 1910 it had sold 47,000 copies. By 1915 the number had soared to 150,000 copies. Therese’s autobiography not only made her known and loved throughout the world, it also broadcast her particular spirituality, the Little Way, in which Therese assured her readers that even the least thing done for love of God can help one grow in holiness. The name, “the Little Way,” may be a product of 19th-century sentimentality, but the method Therese advocated for advancing toward spiritual perfection was rooted in the writings of St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila, and Thomas á Kempis’ Imitation of Christ.

As Therese’s fame spread literally thousands of people claimed that they had received favors through her intercession. At one point the Lisieux Carmel was receiving 500 letters a day, all of them about Therese. {ln:Pope} Pius XI canonized Therese in 1925. And in 1997 {ln:Pope} John Paul II declared the Little Flower a Doctor of the Church.

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Prayer to the saints is a powerful thing.

Now, with Saints for Every Occasion, readers can quickly find help for any challenge they face – no matter how large or small. Author Thomas J. Craughwell profiles 101 patron saints from various continents, cultures and times – from saints who were contemporaries of Christ, to modern patrons like Padre Pio and Faustina Kowalska. Each saint lived heroically in difficult times and circumstances, providing powerful examples of how to turn almost any obstacle into a source of grace. Along with old favorites such as St. Anthony and St. Jude, Craughwell offers patrons for specifically modern concerns, including, for example, saints to watch over astronauts, internet users and environmental activists. Beautifully illustrated and entertainingly told, Saints for Every Occasion features 101 patron saints readers will seek out time and again.

“An excellent resource for home and classroom use.” – Publisher’s Weekly {/tabs}