Before her death, St. Thérèse said:

“I feel that my mission is about to begin, my mission of making others love God as I love Him, my mission of teaching my little way to souls. If God answers my prayers, my heaven will be spent on earth up until the end of the world. Yes, I want to spend my heaven doing good on earth.”

“After my death I will let fall a shower of roses”

Pope Pius X declared her “The Greatest Saint of modern times.” Although she lived a very hidden life, her writings, published after her death in every language, had a universal appeal. Her autobiography, ‘Story of a soul’, is one of the greatest best sellers after the Bible. She rapidly became one of the best-known teachers of the spiritual life. The foundation of her Little Way of holiness is the most basic and universal truth of the Gospel: ‘that God is our Father and we are his children.’

Thérèse makes the light of the Gospel shine brightly. The core of her message is the mystery if God’s infinite love and mercy. She teaches that “we cannot have too much trust in the good God who is so mighty and so merciful.” “I cannot be afraid of a God who made himself so small for me” she said.

Missionary Spirit

Saint Thérèse had immense desires. She wanted to spread the Gospel on all five continents, to be a missionary from the beginning of time until the end of the world. She felt that God had put these desires into her heart and that He could bring them to fulfilment. These intense aspirations to be an apostle won for her the title Patroness of the Missions. The Visit of Thérèse’s Relics to over forty countries, and now to our own Diocese, is a wonderful answer to her prayers. She is coming to us to remind us of her Little Way of total trust and confidence in God’s love and mercy, and that message is for everyone.

Model for Young people

Thérèse reached the heights of holiness in the prime of youth. Hers was a very short life. She entered Carmel at fifteen, died of Tuberculosis just nine years later at the age of twenty-four, having never left the enclosure of her Convent. She is renowned for her simplicity and wisdom: ‘I bless you, Father, for hiding these things from the learned and the clever and revealing them to little ones.’ Mt. 11:25

As a Carmelite and apostle, a teacher of spiritual wisdom and patroness of the missions, she has a privileged place in the Church. When in 1997, Pope John Paul II solemnly proclaimed her a Doctor of the Church, Thérèse became the youngest Doctor of the Church.

Messenger of Hope for our anxious times

Thérèse was certain that after her death whatever she asked God, He would grant. “In Heaven God will do everything I ask Him, because I never did my own will on earth. Since the age of three I have refused Him nothing.” During her life she resolved to remain at the foot of the Cross to receive grace and pour it out on souls. The souls of sinners attracted Thérèse. She entered Carmel ‘to pray for sinners and especially for the souls of priests’. In this year of the Priesthood we should ask her intercession for all priests, and those in our own Diocese. Thérèse was given two missionary priests to pray for, her “spiritual brothers”. She said: “It is by prayer and sacrifice that we can help missionaries.”

Mission to reveal to the world God’s merciful love

This once in a lifetime opportunity to welcome Thérèse to our Diocese promises to bring tremendous graces and blessings. It will be a time of grace for reconciliation, healing and renewed commitment to Christ and the Gospel. Nobody is outside the mercy of God. We are all his children and each one of us is infinitely loved. Thérèse said “My way is all confidence and love.” Let this be our way to the Father.

“What pleases God in me is the blind trust I have in His mercy. That is my sole treasure. Why should it not be yours? I am certain of this — if my conscience were burdened with all the sins that can be committed, I would still go and throw myself into our Lord’s arms, my heart broken with sorrow. I know what tenderness he has for the prodigal child who returns to him.”

Sister Cecilia Elizabeth ocd

Prioress Carmelite Convent, Darlington