St. Therese Lisieux worldly photographs

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Sinnergy said:
Sigh, aren’t all women beautiful and radiant in some way? My mother grew up a very devout Catholic and was quite beautiful to my father and to us, but maybe other folks might not agree. I guess my point is, to quote Ray Stevens, “everything is beautiful, in it’s own way”.

I wonder if anyone has pics of “ugly” or unattractive saints?

Pax Christi,

Sinnergy
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My only point is that if a woman is beautiful, she’s beautiful.
Photos can rarely hide that quality, not even for saintly, holy women.
 
Sinnergy said:
Sigh, aren’t all women beautiful and radiant in some way? My mother grew up a very devout Catholic and was quite beautiful to my father and to us, but maybe other folks might not agree. I guess my point is, to quote Ray Stevens, “everything is beautiful, in it’s own way”.

I wonder if anyone has pics of “ugly” or unattractive saints?

Pax Christi,

Sinnergy
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Well not all of us photograph half as well as St Therese, St Bernadette or Mother Cabrini, put it that way.

I don’t think, with the best will in the world, that you could say even Mother Teresa looked nearly as photogenic in later years.

And I’d imagine those saints who weren’t so telegenic would tend not to get photographed, or at least not so often.
 
BarbaraTherese said:
Blessed Mary Mackillop
All photographs taken from the following, where all information (including all photographs through her years) can be sighted:
sosj.org.au/mary/photos.html

A young a beautiful nun:
http://www.sosj.org.au/mary/photos/05.jpg

Remnants of a younger Mary, aging but still signs of the young and beautiful woman.
http://www.sosj.org.au/mary/photos/16.jpg

Blessed Mary Mackillop towards the end of her life:
http://www.sosj.org.au/mary/photos/17.jpg
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What?:confused: She looks like Eleanor Roosevelt. :rolleyes: I guess beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder. 😉
 
Now St. Bernadette IS truly beautiful. 😃 And St. Therese Lisieux is very cute indeed. :yup: Just because they’re saintly doesn’t make them physically beautiful. I’m applying a strictly physical standard of beauty here.
 
There are interesting stories behind the pictures.

Therese was trying to enter Carmel at 15 years old, too young. So she had a photo shot of her ‘all dressed up’’–looking older, she thought, with her hair up in a bun! It apparently worked, though I think that her extreme youth was one of the causes for her early demise. Others who entered older were more able to withstand the rigors of Carmel.

The nuns often put on plays in the Carmel; Therese wrote a lot of poetry for her superior. Celine was a photographer. So Therese, a favorite in the Carmel, dressed up as St. Joan, with a wig, for one of these plays–a saint portraying a saint.

It was part of Therese’ spirituality that she would not be incorrupt–she predicted this before she died. Hers was the ‘Little Way", no heroics, even in death (tho’ she was very heroic).
 
Mark_Robert said:
What?:confused: She looks like Eleanor Roosevelt. :rolleyes: I guess beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder. 😉
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I think if we had real pictures of our saints in very mature age after a long hard life physically, mentally and spiritually (as was Mary’s) we would have heaps of photographs of ‘Eleanor Roosevelt’? look alikes? Mary was a quite beautiful young woman and her religious habit, I think, once she took it and as a quite young woman made for a very beautiful young nun and potential saint. All the reproductions of Mary for “saint image” type reasons take the young nun as model:D …yet Mary was probably more of the saint in her quite advanced years than in her younger years when she was just starting off on the road to sanctity. She used to gallavant around on a horse in our extreme hot Australian summers in the bush going from convent to convent etc. and in the very heavy indeed habit she had adopted - without moisturizer or sunscreen;) …not good for the complexion and dries out the skin causing early wrinklinghttp://smileys.smileycentral.com/cat/36/36_11_1.gif We do tend to love these romantic pretty type images of our saints. Actually, I love them very human and not at all ‘catwalk types’!😃 …gives a body some sort of remote hope…
 
Here is St. Paula Frassinetti

images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.sistersofsaintdorothy.org/images/paulaoval4.gif&imgrefurl=http://www.sistersofsaintdorothy.org/foundress.html&h=170&w=160&sz=12&hl=en&start=7&um=1&tbnid=XujESvTmkGf_IM:&tbnh=99&tbnw=93&prev=/images%3Fq%3D%2522paula%2Bfrassinetti%2522%26ndsp%3D18%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN

Foundress of the Sisters of St. Dorothy.

I stayed in the hostel that used to be their convent, and on the second floor was her body – claimed to be incorrupt, but I would say mummified, not entirely incorrupt like some of the other saints.

In any event, the fact of a mummified body lying in the same building as I was staying was a source of mild concern, but then one morning I decided to face my fears, and went to the chapel where she lay. Luckily, some kind nun asked me if I wanted to go in, and turned on all the lights, etc. for me. Obviously they have no fear, but it took me a while to slowly approach the glass enclosure.

I prayed for purity of thought, and she was a perfect one to intercede in this regard. Seeing her in her young state, I could see how she could be quite an attractive girl to many. But seeing the dried corpse in front of me… ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

The corpse was wearing the same kind of frilly white head covering as shown in the picture, as well…!
 
BarbaraTherese said:
I think if we had real pictures of our saints in very mature age after a long hard life physically, mentally and spiritually (as was Mary’s) we would have heaps of photographs of ‘Eleanor Roosevelt’? look alikes? Mary was a quite beautiful young woman and her religious habit, I think, once she took it and as a quite young woman made for a very beautiful young nun and potential saint. All the reproductions of Mary for “saint image” type reasons take the young nun as model:D …yet Mary was probably more of the saint in her quite advanced years than in her younger years when she was just starting off on the road to sanctity. She used to gallavant around on a horse in our extreme hot Australian summers in the bush going from convent to convent etc. and in the very heavy indeed habit she had adopted - without moisturizer or sunscreen;) …not good for the complexion and dries out the skin causing early wrinklinghttp://smileys.smileycentral.com/cat/36/36_11_1.gif We do tend to love these romantic pretty type images of our saints. Actually, I love them very human and not at all ‘catwalk types’!😃 …gives a body some sort of remote hope…
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I’ve seen another photo of her as a young woman (unfortunately I can’t find it on the internet) before she entered religious life, so sans habit. I can vouch that she was an attractive young lady.
 
LilyM said:
I’ve seen another photo of her as a young woman (unfortunately I can’t find it on the internet) before she entered religious life, so sans habit. I can vouch that she was an attractive young lady.
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…👍 …
 
Nothing scandalous about those pictures. I’m wondering if the original post was a joke. As for incorruption, are any of the apostles incorrupt? Does it matter, as we who are one in Christ will be raised up on the last day?
  • Westy
 
Hey 7rosario: You know, your question caught my eye and I hope that my answer will give you some peace. Just as in the schools, the convents use the lives of saints to teach the virtues, courage and love of God through sight. It is not common that they act out parts of the lives of the saiints that they are celebrating that month or day. It starts with theater art, but it is in the profound meaning of the acts going on that count. There is no reading between the lines in The Little Flower’s acting part in this picture. It is what it was meant to mean, follow Christ with courage, love, wisdom and intelligence no matter what you look like or what your carreer is. Please reply, Thanks
 
blancagraham said:
Hey 7rosario: You know, your question caught my eye and I hope that my answer will give you some peace. Just as in the schools, the convents use the lives of saints to teach the virtues, courage and love of God through sight. It is not common that they act out parts of the lives of the saiints that they are celebrating that month or day. It starts with theater art, but it is in the profound meaning of the acts going on that count. There is no reading between the lines in The Little Flower’s acting part in this picture. It is what it was meant to mean, follow Christ with courage, love, wisdom and intelligence no matter what you look like or what your carreer is. Please reply, Thanks
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I read somewhere that virgins don’t want to see people (lest they be tempted) or to be seen by people. (lest they be an occasion of temptation to others).

Also I’m under the impression that a nun should have her bald head (as a meaning of renouncing the world) covered but she was wearing a wig in here and even allowed herself to be photographed. On one of the photograph she is reclining her head on her arm.

I see your point that one can also learn saints’ virtues through visual effects of a theatre but borrowing all that costume can be costly at any rate you can learn more efficiently by reading books like this The True Spouse of Jesus Christ: books.google.com/books?id=srPUGnO3xs4C&printsec=frontcover&dq=true+spouse+christ&ei=IxDESL3JCoz6jgGQmdyaBg#PRA1-PA126,M1
 
Hello 7rosario: These pieces of theater art are done for the convent nuns and/or someone the superiors invited, linked to the convent. I don’t believe outsiders are invited.

The inocense on how the actors (in this case St. Therese) portray a saint (because these are the only people nuns portray)
is accepted and encouraged by their superiors, to instill in the viewers that saints are humans, too. That the only thing you need to be a saint is your humanity to start, then elevate it to be Christ like…She was told to do this, she obeyed for higher reasons.

Nuns have all sorts of women coming in with their own careers and abilities. The wardrobe was either made there or donated, as well as the wig.

I agree though besides theater art, some books are efficient ways of teaching .
 
St Therese is beautiful and very holy, I feel one does not need visible miracles to become a Saint and I believe it even more so, after reading Story of a Soul,you should read that…and plus, if Joan of Arc appeared that way, why should anyone hold it against St Therese for appearing that way either?..does it really take away her holiness?
 
I know what photos the OP is referring to-and they are definitely NOT INAPPRPOPRIATE!

In the one of her at 15, it was taken before she even entered Carmel. She has her hair up adult-fashion, and the Bishop of Bayeux complimented her on it when she and her father visited him.

In the other ones, which show her as St. Joan of Arc, she still has her habit on underneath the ‘armor’, and she’s wearing a long wig on her head.

As her being incorrupt. it didn’t happen. In fact, when she was dying, one of the Sisters made a reference to incorruptibility, and she said no, it would not happen to her. She wanted all ‘little souls’ to imitate her. She even said, ‘Only my bones will be found’, when she appeared to a Carmelite prioress in Italy before her exhumation.

And I love the picture of St. Gemma…bella feminina!
 
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