Saint Therese of Lisieux: A Gateway

Thanks to the Baron de Moidrey and the electronic library at Lisieux, I discovered an album of photos of the town taken in 1872, the year before Therese's birth and five years before Louis Martin and his five daughters moved there.  At http://www.bmlisieux.com/galeries/lisieux01/lis01.htm you may see the appearance in 1872 of the Martins' parish church, St. Jacques; the Cathedral of St. Pierre, where they went to Sunday Mass; the old houses on the Grande-Rue; and the Public Gardens, which Therese crossed on her way home from the Guerins. The town, home to a Carmelite monastery founded thirty-four years earlier, looks very tranquil.  One would not guess that in 1925 Pius XI, receiving the pilgrims from Lisieux who had come to Rome for the canonization of the little girl born in Alencon and brought up in Lisieux, would say "A storm, a deluge of glory has descended on Lisieux." 

http://thereseoflisieux.org