"Saint Therese"

"Little Flower"

"Saint Therese has always been one of my favorite Saints.  Recently, I received an email in regard to Saint Therese requesting information about her from someone who recently lost their daughter to death.  I was so moved by this email, along with the prayer, that I have created this page."

In part, this is what she stated:

Comment: I was looking for information on St Theresa Novena because of my daughter. She died on 1/17/02 and on that day a close friend of ours was sent an e-mail from a friend in Ireland. It was a prayer titled "St Theresa Novena". It read:

May today there be peace within
May you trust your highest power
That you are exactly where you are meant to be May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.
May you use those gifts that you have received, and Pass on the love that has been given to you
May you be content knowing you are the child of God.
Let this presence settle into our bones, and allow your soul the freedom
To sing, dance and bask in the sun.
It is there for each and every one of you...

The good friend who told me about this said that the fact that the novena arrived at the time of our daughters death is a great sign that all is well and that our daughter Tiffany left this valley of tears with the innocent joy of youth, and unspoiled heart and a spiritual soul dressed and ready to enter the banquet hall in Heaven.

I have to believe all of this has to have some meaning to her death...

I have left their name:

~Anonymous~

 

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http://www.ewtn.com/therese/therese.htm

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http://www.monasteryicons.com/porduct41.html

Saint Therese of Lisieux

On her deathbed in 1897 Saint Therese said: “After my death I will let fall a shower of roses.” This shower of roses was graces and miracles she bestowed on those who sought her help, symbolically represented in Brother Simeon’s icon of this holy nun. By special permission of Pope Leo XIII she was allowed to enter the Carmelite convent at Lisieux at the young age of 15.

In her autobiographical “The Story of a Soul” she describes her “little way” of simplicity and perfection in the doing of small things and discharge of daily duties which has become an inspiration and a pattern of holiness to “ordinary” people. After a painful last illness, she died at the age of 26, with words of divine love on her lips. She is the patroness of France, aviators, florists, and foreign missions, and appeared many times during World War II to give miraculous help to Allied forces.

 

 

 

St. Therese of Lisieux, the "Little Flower"

Therese Martin was born in Alencon France in 1873, the youngest of nine children. Her father, Louis,  was a successful watchmaker and jeweler. Her mother Zelie Guerin,  built a cottage industry in lace making, beginning in the village of Alencon, which is known for its delicate lace. Four of Therese's siblings died at a young age; the remaining five girls eventually all entered the convent, so deep was their call to sanctity. Four became contemplative Carmelite Nuns at the Lisieux Carmel, and one became a Visitation sister.

 

Therese wasn't always a nun nor was she always a saint. She was a very regular little girl, who was rather sensitive.  In fact, she seemed like a spoiled little girl, who would stomp her feet and have a temper tantrum if she did not get her own way.   After the death of her mother, while Therese was only 4, her father, who referred to her as "my little queen" would give her anything she wanted to keep her happy.  Louis Martin was protective of his daughters.  He wouldn't allow them to read the newspapers, fearful that it would make them too worldly. But the mischievous girls would steal away with the newspaper while papa napped and carefully return it before he awoke.

 At a young age, this precocious child wanted everything.  She would get more than she bargained for.  Sick physically and emotionally, she was healed by Our Lady of the Smile at the age of 11.  She experienced a profound conversion on Christmas eve, 1886, at the age of 13.  She felt a call to enter Carmel as a contemplative Nun, so that she could give herself totally to Jesus.  But she was too young.  Appeals to the Mother Superior and Priest Chaplain yielded: "when you are old enough -16".  Not content, Therese and her father appealed to the Bishop.  Not getting the response she wanted, she appealed directly and personally to the Pope while on a parish pilgrimage to Rome.  Therese had always said: "I want everything" - and she usually got it.

 

Persistence paid off.  Therese was allowed to enter the Lisieux Carmel at the age of 15 - her father lived to see her professed a Carmelite Nun.  She took the religious name of Sister Therese of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face.  God's spirit worked powerfully in Therese, so open was she to Divine Love.  Still dreaming of taking on the world as a priest and missionary, she wrestled with her vocation and place in the Church.  Finally she came to realize that her "vocation is love" - the love of God was the energy source for the Church - and fulfillment of the human heart and longing.

Despite her desire for the dramatic and expansive, Therese developed a simple spirituality, based on childlike trust and confidence in God. The spirituality of her "little way" was not about extraordinary things - but rather about doing simple things of life well and with extraordinary love.  She believed and taught that "everything is grace" - God's face and presence could be experienced in every person and situation of our lives, if we just attend with love and expectancy.  Her struggle, like ours, is to be where God places us in the real life situations of our lives.  Therese's is a hands-on, challenging and focused spirituality.  This is what made Therese shine, and why she has been declared a Doctor of the Church.  Her spirituality is simple, childlike, profound and human - it is refreshing in our confusing and complicated age.

Experiencing the dark night of the senses and spirit refined the power and energy of this young, precocious Carmelite.  Her poems and plays reflect her struggle to give all to God.  Her love became surrender, as she slowly died of tuberculosis.  Her superior asked her to write down her reflections, which became her autobiography, "Story of a Soul."  She died at the age of 24, believing that her life was really just beginning for God, promising to spend her heaven doing good on earth.  Her promised "shower of roses" began and have become a torrent in the Church ever since.

 

 

The above is a photograph of the St. Therese Shrine in Lisieux, France.

She was canonized by the Church in 1925, when she would have been only 52 years old.  In October, 1997, Pope John Paul II declared her a Doctor of the Church, because of the impact and challenge her spirituality has had on the lives of so many of God's children.

 

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http://www.littleflower.org

"Let us go forward in peace, our eyes upon heaven, the only one goal of our labors."

- St. Thérèse

Saint Thérèse
of Lisieux, Virgin.
Celebration of Feast Day is
October 1.

 

http://www.ewtn.com/therese/therese1.htm

At the age of thirteen.
 

Miracles and graces were being attributed to her intercession, and within twenty-eight years after death, this simple young nun had been canonized.

Taken from "Lives of Saints",
Published by John J. Crawley & Co., Inc.

 

The spread of devotion to St. Therese of Lisieux is one of the impressive religious manifestations of our time. During her few years on earth this young French Carmelite was scarcely to be distinguished from many another devoted nun, but her death brought an almost immediate awareness of her unique gifts. Through her letters, the word-of-mouth tradition originating with her fellow-nuns, and especially through the publication of <Histoire d'un ame>, Therese of the Child Jesus or "The Little Flower" soon came to mean a great deal to numberless people; she had shown them the way of perfection in the small things of every day. Miracles and graces were being attributed to her intercession, and within twenty-eight years after death, this simple young nun had been canonized. In 1936 a basilica in her honor at Lisieux was opened and blessed by Cardinal Pacelli; and it was he who, in 1944, as Pope, declared her the secondary patroness of France. "The Little Flower" was an admirer of St. Teresa of Avila, and a comparison at once suggests itself. Both were christened Teresa, both were Carmelites, and both left interesting autobiographies. Many temperamental and intellectual differences separate them, in addition to the differences of period and of race; but there are striking similarities. They both patiently endured severe physical sufferings; both had a capacity for intense religious experience; both led lives made radiant by the love of Christ.

Therese Martin at the age of eight

 

It is not astonishing that the youngest sister, then only nine, had a great desire to follow the one who had been her loving guide.

The parents of the later saint were Louis Martin, a watchmaker of Alencon, France, son of an army officer, and Azelie-Marie Guerin, a lace maker of the same town. Only five of their nine children lived to maturity; all five were daughters and all were to become nuns. Francoise-Marie Therese, the youngest, was born on January 2, 1873. Her childhood must have been normally happy, for her first memories, she writes, are of smiles and tender caresses. Although she was affectionate and had much natural charm, Therese gave no sign of precocity. When she was only four, the family was stricken by the sad blow of the mother's death. Monsieur Martin gave up his business and established himself at Lisieux, Normandy, where Madame Martin's brother lived with his wife and family. The Guerins, generous and loyal people, were able to ease the father's responsibilities through the years by giving to their five nieces practical counsel and deep affection.

The Martins were now and always united in the closest bonds. The eldest daughter, Marie, although only thirteen, took over the management of the household, and the second, Pauline, gave the girls religious instruction. When the group gathered around the fire on winter evenings, Pauline would read aloud works of piety, such as the <Liturgical Year >of Dom Gueranger. Their lives moved along quietly for some years, then came the first break in the little circle. Pauline entered the Carmelite convent of Lisieux. She was to advance steadily in her religious vocation, later becoming prioress. It is not astonishing that the youngest sister, then only nine, had a great desire to follow the one who had been her loving guide. Four years later, when Marie joined her sister at the Carmel, Therese's desire for a life in religion was intensified. Her education during these years was in the hands of the Benedictine nuns of the convent of Notre- Dame-du-Pre. She was confirmed there at the age of eleven.

In her autobiography Therese writes that her personality changed after her mother's death, and from being childishly merry she became withdrawn and shy. While Therese was indeed developing into a serious-minded girl, it does not appear that she became markedly sad. We have many evidences of liveliness and fun, and the oral tradition, as w