Therese celebrated her feast every year on October 15, the feast of St. Teresa of Avila ("Therese" being merely the French version of "Teresa").  On October 15, 1889 she wrote to her sister Celine to thank her for feast day gifts.  Therese was then a 16-year-old novice, already in Carmel for eighteen months.  Eight months before their father had been taken to the Bon Sauveur aslyum at Caen, where he would remain for two and a half years more.  An excerpt from Therese's letter:

"Celine . . . . Your letter pleased me very much; I felt how much our souls were made to understand each other, and to walk by the same way! . . . . Life, ah, it's true, for us it has no more attraction . . . but I am mistaken.  It's true that the attractions of this world have vanished for us, but this is only a smoke, and the reality remains for us.  Yes, life is a treasure . . . each moment is an eternity, an eternity of joy in heaven, an eternity of seeing God face to face, of being one with Him!  . . . There is only Jesus who is; all the rest is not . . . . Let us love Him, then, unto folly; let us save souls for Him."¹

"Only Jesus is; all the rest is not . . . ."  How these words echo Therese's courageous dedication to reality, she who would say at the end of her life,  "O my God . . . . Make me see things as they really are.  Let nothing cause me to be deceived."²

http://thereseoflisieux.org

¹"Letters of Saint Therese: General Correspondence," Volume One, translated by John Clarke, O.C.D.  Copyright 1982 by Washington Province of Discalced Carmelites, Inc., ICS Publications.

²"St. Therese of Lisieux: Her Last Conversations,"  translated by John Clarke, O.C.D.  Copyright 1977 by Washington Province of Discalced Carmelites, Inc., ICS Publications., p. 105, July 21, 1897

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

October 4 - Therese's funeral day

Sister Therese of the Child Jesus died on Thursday evening, September 30, in the infirmary of the Lisieux Carmel. Her funeral took place in the chapel of the Carmel on Monday morning, October 4, at 9:00. Below please see, courtesy of Ana Cantoni, the clipping from the newspaper Le Normand of her death notice:

An approximate English translation:

Deaths

"It is with a keen feeling of sadness that we learned, Thursday evening, of the death at the monastery of Our Lady of Carmel of a young person who spent the most beautiful years of her youth in a life of prayer and sacrifice.  Miss Marie-Francoise-Therese Martin renounced the world at the age of fifteen.  Consecrating herself to God, she became Sister Therese of the Child Jesus.  She spent years of angelic life in the cloister, and the death which came to end them, by putting a stop to her long and cruel sufferings, has already given her, we have a sweet confidence, the immortal crown which was the object of her continual aspirations here below.

The funeral will be celebrated Monday morning at nine o'clock in the chapel of the Carmel.  Le Normand offers to the family of Sister Therese of the Child Jesus, to the Mother Prioress, and to all the religious of Carmel the homage of its respectful condolences."

After the funeral Mass the body of Sister Therese was taken to the Carmelite plot in the town cemetery, accompanied by a small group of mourners.  Her sister, Leonie Martin, was the chief mourner, for Uncle Isidore was too sick to attend.  The Carmelites were represented by an extern sister.  Leonie testified that the only remarkable thing about the ceremony was the great recollection of the crowd.  Who could have guessed that day that her real death notice, "Story of a Soul," would light up the world; that the tomb would soon be thronged with pilgrims; that, when her body was returned to Carmel in 1923, even before she was beatified, fifty thousand pilgrims would follow her; and that on the hill near the cemetery the basilica of St. Therese would be built? 

I begin this blog of St. Therese of Lisieux on the vigil of her feast in 2007 in thanksgiving for her presence in my life and her powerful influence in the world.  I hope this online journal will be a radiant center to reflect on the life and spirituality of St. Therese and how she can help us in our own spiritual formation.  I also want to introduce you to the Web site,"Saint Therese of Lisieux: A Gateway," a window to the life, spirituality, writings, and mission of St. Therese.

To celebrate the feast, please watch the film St. Therese of the Child Jesus: An Echo of the Heart of God.  This splendid documentary visits Therese's birthplace at Alencon, home at Lisieux, and Carmelite monastery.  What pilgrims to Lisieux cannot see, you can: the buildings where Therese spent her last nine years; the choir where she prayed; her cell; the infirmary where she died.  The Carmelites of today gather for recreation in the "heated room" where Therese was asked to write her memoirs.  One of them shows us her cell, her writing-desk, her image of the Holy Face.  Expert color photography of the Theresian places as they are today blends with 19th-century photographs of Therese, her fellow Carmelites, and documents.  Bishop Guy Gaucher, Carmelite and expert on St. Therese, speaks of her life and her faith.  This 90-minute film, which includes long visits to the places  Therese knew and her Carmel, is a true virtual pilgrimage.  I recommend it iwthout reservation.