The sense of humour in St. Therese of Lisieux

[BarbaraTherese]

“God deliver
***me from sad-faced Saints.” ***
(St. Teresa of Avila)

http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/fatherpius/carme_pict0.jpeg
St. Therese of Lisieux

I did look online for a copy of the Primitive Constitutions of St. Teresa of Jesus for the Discalced Carmelites (1567-1568) but could locate one. I have a copy of them here in small book form (of long standing) and these Constitutions give much insight into Teresa of Avila herself as well as her desires for her Carmelite nuns as nuns. Here is an extract only from Article 27 that I find most charming and adhering amidst many adhering matters indeed in St. Teresa’s original Constitution! :“No kind of game is to be permitted, for The Lord will give grace to some to amuse the others. Provided this principale be observed, the time will always be spent well. Let them try not to annoy one another, both their fun and their talk must be marked by discretion…”

Sense of Humour in St. Therese of Lisieux
Father Pius Edwin Sammut
Discalced Carmelite
HERE

Extract from Text only

Her Last Conversations). Here’s how one of the nuns in the Lisieux Carmel, Sr. Marie of the Angels described Therese long before she became the familiar holy card image that we now know. She said “Sr. Therese of the Child Jesus, novice and jewel of the community, tall and strong, with the expression of a child, hiding within her a wisdom, a perfection, and an insight of a fifty year old. Her head is full of mischief to play on anyone she pleases. Mystic, comic, everything. She can make you weep with devotion and just as easily split your sides with laughter during recreations.” Therese saw no incompatibility between humor and spirituality. On the contrary, they’re constantly interwoven in her life as we can see in all the stories that she tells about herself and that others told about her.

From a talk on Therese’s humor
given at the 1997 OCDS Congress
in Long Island.
By…Father Steven Payne, O.C.D***.***
HERE

---

Extract from Text only - although much of this text seems to be drawn from the Fr. Pius Edwin’s text above, which Fr. Payne does acknowledge…

---

“She knew that God likes us
goofy as we are. He likes variables
and imperfections. What we all
find charming about small children
is how they bungle up words, how
they make funny little pictures, how
they alter stories in the
telling…exactly what is so beautiful
about them is their imperfection.
You may have heard the story about
the little girl who was telling a
shocked mum that before she goes
to bed she likes telling Jesus jokes
and how much He was pleased last
night when she told him the joke
about the chicken crossing the road.
"But He surely knows that joke!!”,
the mother remarks. "Yes, but God
told me that no one ever bothered
to TELL IT TO HIM…!!”
Carmelite spirituality is something
deadly serious. And because it is
serious it is full of joy! Our God is a
happy God. “I have told you this so
that my joy may be in you and that
your joy may be complete.”
(John 15,11)
The one who started the whole
Carmelite adventure, Saint Teresa of
Avila, used to remark : “God deliver
me from sad-faced Saints.” “

 

[Trishie]

Thank you BarbaraTherese for this delightful glimpse into the wholesome humanity of this young saint. I am charmed by Fr Payne’s talk drawn partly from Fr Pius Edwin’s text. Thank you for sharing it.

I have long felt disapointed that the gospels never specifically say, “Jesus laughed”. We can sometimes infer or interpret some event in such a way that we detect humour in the way Jesus spoke. However, I do wish the dear writers of the gospels might have said, “Jesus laughed”, as clearly as it was stated, “Jesus wept” (for instance, over the death of Lazarus) (John 11, v.35/36). I can’t doubt that in His healthy emotional life and wholesome human relationships, Jesus’ laugh rang cheerfully to others’ ears. I simply believe that it would have been enlightening for followers who may have felt goodness and holiness is a deadly serious business.
Regarding holiness

Dear Jesus, please reveal brilliantly to all, that You do not require that individuals need to be regarded as Saints, in order to be Your saints. Assure them that holiness is Your action, not ours! Let them read the gospels and reflect on what they read, discovering that You were truly human, that you wept, felt pain, joy, and exasperation, “How long do I have to put up with this faithless generation!”) [Mark 9:19]

You became angry [in the Temple]. You were sometimes disappointed, sometimes weary. You felt the need to be alone, and the desire to escape a dreadful ordeal (“let this cup pass from me”). [Luke 22:42] Then in the depths of suffering, You found faith difficult, (“My God, why have You abandoned me?”) [Psalm 22:1]

Why did not the evangelists record Your laughter! How sober of them! However, they do record as Your lyrical delight over little children, (“Blessed are You, Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth! You have revealed to little ones, the mysteries of Your Kingdom!” [Matthew 11:25]

Jesus, ask Your people to observe that You lived the ordinary life for about thirty years. If You had not wanted to make such an issue about being vulnerably human, You could have come as a glorious, fully developed human Personage.

Jesus, truly human, truly God, pray for us, that we may live humanly wholesome and thus holy lives.

Trishie. St Therese, dear, delightful soul, please intercede for us.
Bless you for sharing Your insights, BarbaraTherese!

I have a book, St Teresa and Friendship, which is a wonderful glimpse into St Teresa of Avila/Jesus’ wholesome friendships

 

[brigid12]

You may have heard the story about
the little girl who was telling a
shocked mum that before she goes
to bed she likes telling Jesus jokes
and how much He was pleased last
night when she told him the joke
about the chicken crossing the road.
"But He surely knows that joke!!”,
the mother remarks. "Yes, but God
told me that no one ever bothered
to TELL IT TO HIM…!!”

Although I loved that St. Teresa of Avila didn’t like sad-faced Saints, I’d forgotten the mischief and humor in St. Therese. Thank you so much for reminding me!! I am much too serious! I loved the story of the little girl telling a joke to God - no, I hadn’t heard it.

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Thank you BarbaraTherese for this delightful glimpse into the wholesome humanity of this young saint. I am charmed by Fr Payne’s talk drawn partly from Fr Pius Edwin’s text. Thank you for sharing it.

I have long felt disapointed that the gospels never specifically say, “Jesus laughed”. We can sometimes infer or interpret some event in such a way that we detect humour in the way Jesus spoke. However, I do wish the dear writers of the gospels might have said, “Jesus laughed”, as clearly as it was stated, “Jesus wept” (for instance, over the death of Lazarus) (John 11, v.35/36). I can’t doubt that in His healthy emotional life and wholesome human relationships, Jesus’ laugh rang cheerfully to others’ ears. I simply believe that it would have been enlightening for followers who may have felt goodness and holiness is a deadly serious business.
Regarding holiness

Dear Jesus, please reveal brilliantly to all, that You do not require that individuals need to be regarded as Saints, in order to be Your saints. Assure them that holiness is Your action, not ours! Let them read the gospels and reflect on what they read, discovering that You were truly human, that you wept, felt pain, joy, and exasperation, “How long do I have to put up with this faithless generation!”) [Mark 9:19]

You became angry [in the Temple]. You were sometimes disappointed, sometimes weary. You felt the need to be alone, and the desire to escape a dreadful ordeal (“let this cup pass from me”). [Luke 22:42] Then in the depths of suffering, You found faith difficult, (“My God, why have You abandoned me?”) [Psalm 22:1]

Why did not the evangelists record Your laughter! How sober of them! However, they do record as Your lyrical delight over little children, (“Blessed are You, Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth! You have revealed to little ones, the mysteries of Your Kingdom!” [Matthew 11:25]

Jesus, ask Your people to observe that You lived the ordinary life for about thirty years. If You had not wanted to make such an issue about being vulnerably human, You could have come as a glorious, fully developed human Personage.

Jesus, truly human, truly God, pray for us, that we may live humanly wholesome and thus holy lives.

Trishie. St Therese, dear, delightful soul, please intercede for us.
Bless you for sharing Your insights, BarbaraTherese!

I have a book, St Teresa and Friendship, which is a wonderful glimpse into St Teresa of Avila/Jesus’ wholesome friendships

Hi again Trishie…and thank you again for sharing your thoughts! Of course Jesus would have laughed since he was fully human like us in all things except sin and laughing is no sin - well I dont think , we just have no record of it “many things Jesus did and said are not recorded”…and I think this appears in St. John’s Gospel. I often think that the little story of Nicodemas climbing the tree because he was short in stature to see Jesus as he passed, and Jesus, catching sight of this guy up in a tree to see him, looks up and says laughingly “Hey you up there in the tree, how about climbing down so I can have lunch with you?”…not in the Gospel for sure, but one potential scenario! Obviously the man has climbed the tree out of eagerness to see Jesus and so Jesus decides to reward his great desire by actually sharing a meal with him…and if I reflect on this, it is a mischieviously lovely gesture. In my imagination Nicodemas almost falls out the tree with shock - the last thing he expected was to be lunching with Jesus - let alone that Jesus would speak to him and being the despised person he was. All he was hoping for was just a glimpse of him as he passed, not being able to see over the crowds, nor push through to the front.
The Lord is full of surprises still!

We have come through a long spiritual age where spirituality and all it is was treated as a deadly serious matter, and so it is…but in the process I think perhaps we have lost the wondrous element of joy in it, not only for us, but for The Lord, and so have lost in the main an ability to laugh which is an element or by product of joy. A fringe benefit of a joyful heart.

Many of our saints had a sense of humour and it can flicker in their writings in a passing comment or phrase, a sentence…or even something more explicit and very often this has been edited out of their writings … reflecting a long age when laughter and spirituality were not compatible. This happened with St. Therese’s writings.

Sometimes I can think, say or do something that is truly ridiculous or perhaps mischievious and in my imagination I can see Jesus laughing in Heaven…and I laugh because Jesus is laughing and I love to give Jesus cause to laugh…since it seems from what we can know of his life, he seems to have had little reason for laughter while he lived here on earth…although if he never laughed, then would he have been fully human like us.

I have a book, St Teresa and Friendship, which is a wonderful glimpse into St Teresa of Avila/Jesus’ wholesome friendships

I almost missed the above in small print…can you share the title of the book book please? I’d love to read it. Again many of our saints had great friendships, close friendships, and though celibate - with the opposite sex. St. Clare and St. Francis, St. Francis de Sales and Jane Chantel I think it was, St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of The Cross. Once these happy friendships were played down or not underscored for the role they played in the saints lives and even in their sanctity, and again to my mind, the courtesy of an age when there were not only incorrect hangups about laughter but also about sex and sexuality and the opposite gender relationships.

Blessings and my regards…Barb

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Although I loved that St. Teresa of Avila didn’t like sad-faced Saints, I’d forgotten the mischief and humor in St. Therese. Thank you so much for reminding me!! I am much too serious! I loved the story of the little girl telling a joke to God - no, I hadn’t heard it.

… …Julian of Norwich and also I think one of the Catherines mentions (of Genoa or of Siena) - God dances for the very joy of us and should not we then dance for the very Joy of God…and our very Joy in Him. And I think a joyful and laughing heart is a heart that dances.
As I said, I think we have come out of a long age and are a product of a spirituality where laughter and close opposite sex relationships were discouraged and frowned upon. Much as in St. Teresa of Avila’s day the game of chess was frowned upon very much for ‘pious people’ and good Catholics…yet obviously St. Teresa knew the game well, and how to play it, and in fact has the audacity and provocativeness (tongue in cheek humour I think) to mention it in very close and intimate connection with “His Majesty”( Jesus ) as she sometimes called him
And in fact, St. Teresa takes a mischievious and provocative sense of the ridiculous and stupid in her own age, to push her point to the absolute limit by referring to Jesus as the King in chess and compares an aspect of spirituality to the game of Chess - that really gave me a giggle knowing how chess was frowned deeply upon by the righteous, holy and good Catholics of her day. And this was all in the day when the Inquisition was very active - her own writings were in their hands. There is more to the story than that and quite funny I think, but I wont go into it here, too long.

…the story that I loved was the little girl who wanted to spend time with the new arrival in the family but Mum and Dad were reluctant in case she unintentionally hurt the baby. Finally they relented and let her go into the nursery but they kept the door open a little to keep an eye on things. The daughter walked up to the crib and whispered “Baby, tell me what God is like, I am starting to forget”. Think about it!!! Ahhh “out of the mouths of babies and children comes wisdom to confound the wise” (something like that the quote runs). I loved that story and it appears somewhere in either of the texts I posted.
Deo Gratius!
Blessings and my regards…Barb

 

[MarieVeronica]

Hi Barb. One of the reasons I love St. Therese so much… is because she is SO “reachable”. We can all relate to her on so many, personal levels.

I have read her autobiography “The Story of a Soul” many times. And I particularly loved the “vignette” she laid out… about chasing spiders out of the cloister… and how she conquered her fear of the little beasties. (I’m chuckling again, as I recall the circumstances). Such a “human” saint… was young Therese. She shows us with love AND humor… that we can follow the same path.

Thanks for posting this. I really enjoyed it. God bless.

 

[Trishie]

Everyone I’m very much enjoying the posts of your warm perceptions of these delightfully human Carmelite saints. Have a time limit just now but will return to them later today.

BarbaraTherese, the book I mentioned is
“St Teresa and Friendship” by Norah Melia
Carmelite Communications, Melbourne
241 Richardson St Middle Park, Vic 3206
Australia.
The Carmelites,O’Carm have a good Carmelite library at Middle Park in Melbourne.

Bless you, Trishie

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Everyone I’m very much enjoying the posts of your warm perceptions of these delightfully human Carmelite saints. Have a time limit just now but will return to them later today.

BarbaraTherese, the book I mentioned is
“St Teresa and Friendship” by Norah Melia
Carmelite Communications, Melbourne
241 Richardson St Middle Park, Vic 3206
Australia.
The Carmelites,O’Carm have a good Carmelite library at Middle Park in Melbourne.

Bless you, Trishie

Thanks heaps,Trishie. Just going off to email Pauline Media and find out cost and availability…they are always very good to me and if they dont have it, they will try to get it for me. All my contact with Carmelites have found them very warm and caring people with a great sense of humour.

Blessings and regards…Barb

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Hi Barb. One of the reasons I love St. Therese so much… is because she is SO “reachable”. We can all relate to her on so many, personal levels.

I have read her autobiography “The Story of a Soul” many times. And I particularly loved the “vignette” she laid out… about chasing spiders out of the cloister… and how she conquered her fear of the little beasties. (I’m chuckling again, as I recall the circumstances). Such a “human” saint… was young Therese. She shows us with love AND humor… that we can follow the same path.

Thanks for posting this. I really enjoyed it. God bless.

Hi again MV …From memory only, I gave my copy of her autobiography away and have not as yet re ordered. Apparently the Sisters in Carmel in reading her autobiography decided to edit it a bit to make her sound more ‘saint like’…rather than leave things and let her speak for herself in her very human way. Perhaps the Sisters for a moment forgot that if God wants to make a saint, then He indeed will, with an edit or without one. I think this editing was eventually restored to the original (drawing on memory again). But anyway what we do have gives us much insight into our most human of saints…and indeed we can follow her in all her childlike simplicity with sound theology to back it all up. And The Church I like to think in her caring motherhood, raised Therese to a Doctor of The Church which was sort of a way (to my…ummm…mind) a way of saying…yes, by all means, everyone follow her. And she did promise that when she reached Heaven she would send forth a whole legion of ‘little souls’. And she is so universally very much loved, appreciated and indeed followed.

One little anecdote I love from her life was while a novice and probably still in the process of embracing the Rule as most do. News arrived at the Convent and she wanted to race to her sister, who was prioress, and fill her in and be the first to do so…but instead, she ran to her cell (detachment) and then having had a victory over herself and her impulsiveness and desire to indulge herself, hugged herself with the pure joy of a victory. How very human and so very real! Many wonderful and very telling little anecdotes.

It occured to me one day that saints climb mountains and chuck ladders down.

Blessings…my regards…Barb

 

[Trishie]

This is getting off the point of Therese’s sense of humour, not of ladders and steps though, but onto another aspect of Therese’s ordinary humanity. Even so, there is a wonderful lightness in her thoughts…

In response to a novice who was discouraged by her faults, Therese said, “You make me think of a little child that is learning to stand but does not know how to walk. In his desire to reach to top of the stairs to find his mother, he lifts his little foot to climb the first step. It is all in vain, and at each renewed effort he falls.” “Well, be like that little child. Always keep lifting your foot to climb the ladder of holiness, and do not imagine that you can mount even the first step. All God asks of you is good will. From the top of the ladder, He looks lovingly upon you, and soon, touched by your fruitful efforts, He will Himself come down, and taking you in His arms, will carry you to His Kingdom never again to leave Him. But should you cease to raise your foot, you will not be left for long on the earth.” To another novice, Therese said, “You want to climb the mountain, whereas God wishes you to descend it. He is awaiting you in the valley of humility.” “It seems to me that humility is truth (honesty).” “If the greatest sinner should repent at the moment of his death, and draw his last breath in an act of love, neither the many graces he had abused, nor the multiplied crimes he had committed, would stand in his way. Our Lord would see nothing, count nothing, but the sinner’s last prayer, and without delay He would receive him into the arms of His mercy.”

Our God,
In accepting Your call to wholeness, we choose to love You above all and other persons as ourselves. This call requires us to take up our personal cross and follow You in love, prayer, and service of others. Therefore, it is not arrogant to seek sanctity, for to be truly holy means to be genuinely human. What is truly human is our creation in God’s image. Sin and indifference injures the fullness of our humanity.
Saint Therese of Lisieux encourages us in our attempts towards holiness in our vocation to love and serve. Of her own response to the call, she wrote, “This desire could certainly appear daring if one were to consider how weak and imperfect I was, and how after seven years in the religious life, I am still weak and imperfect. I always feel, however, the same bold confidence of becoming a great saint because I do not count on my own merits since I have none, but I trust in God who is Virtue and Holiness. God alone, content with my weak efforts, will raise me to Himself and make me a saint, clothing me in His infinite merits. I didn’t think then that one had to suffer very much to reach sanctity, but God was not long in showing me this was so and in sending me the trials I have already mentioned.” Therese remarked that such holiness may “not be evident to the eyes of mortals.”

We draw hope from this saint of ‘the consecrated ordinary’, whom Pope John Paul 2 declared a Doctor of the Church on October 19, 1997. Many Sisters in her Carmelite community were unaware of the holiness of her ‘ordinary’ deeds of kindness, and doubted that anything worthwhile could appear in her obituary circular. I implore God for ‘everyday’ love and trust such as Therese maintained before temptations of doubt and suffering. Like her, in ordinariness made holy by union with Jesus our God who lived ‘the ordinary life’, we must become shining lights in an era when disbelief, humanism and self-absorption prevail.

We ask God to give us dynamic confidence that holiness is not reserved for a favoured few. As Saint Paul taught, “each soul is God’s favourite” and God desires fulfilment of each person’s call to love God above all and others as self. Every person has a unique vocation and purpose, intended to enrich each other person’s soul for all eternity.

Therese is indeed a shining inspiration to ordinary human beings like us!!!

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Great post! Thank you for sharing! Reading those extracts really makes me want to get her autobiography again and much encouragement indeed in what you wrote. I was drawn to your words that holiness and sanctity may not be evident to anyone - this really does come out in another work by Jean Pierre de Caussade, although more laboured than the words of St. Therese, “Abandonment to Divine Providence”…although de Caussade does write of not only others not noticing, but oneself either in a very real and actual way that is terribly painful. And de Caussade rather states, to expect this and all the pain that goes with it. Mind you, Abandonment is not a morbid book at all…my poverty only if I have made it sound morbid! I just found it a fascinating concept that he does develop at one point…that though one desires to be a saint and strives mightily for holiness, the inner conviction remains painfully that one is very very far from anything even remotely approaching a saint and that one will never ever get anywhere near it. This is not really morbid at this moment I conclude (as I write this post reflectively) …it is an encouraging thought for those of us who do strive in every way and that goal just seems ever more distant always. That is why the concept fascinated me I can now insight.
St Therese especially towards the end of her life had extremely painful interior things to suffer and she was very ill at the time as well. The same incidentally applies to St. Faustina who was dying at the time she suffered much in an interior way.

We ask God to give us dynamic confidence that holiness is not reserved for a favoured few. As Saint Paul taught, “each soul is God’s favourite” and God desires fulfilment of each person’s call to love God above all and others as self. Every person has a unique vocation and purpose, intended to enrich each other person’s soul for all eternity.

Therese is indeed a shining inspiration to ordinary human beings like us!!!

Apologies, Trishie, but I could not discern if these are your thoughts or those of JPII (all of which comes after "We draw hope from this saint of ‘the consecrated ordinary’, whom Pope John Paul 2 declared a Doctor of the Church on October 19, 1997."…to the end of your Post)… Either way anyway, they are wonderfully encouraging and if they are your words, they are postively inspirational and encouragement. Inspired words.

One thing really caught my eye in the extract: "I didn’t think then that one had to suffer very much to reach sanctity, but God was not long in showing me this was so and in sending me the trials I have already mentioned.” …we can be assured that God would never send trials of any kind without the strength necessary to bear them well coming with them. And whatever God may send into our life, be it great joy or great suffering …or are a mixture of all levels of both, whatever…we can be assured that The Lord is sending sufficient into our lives to make very great saints of us. We can be very sure of that since His desire is to make every single last one of us great saints if we will only let Him. No exceptions whatsoever!

Do you happen to know, Trishie, if St. Therese is a declared mystic? I always thought she was but had to do some research for another thread and could not find any mention of her being declared by The Church “mystic”…she is declared a saint and Doctor of The Church only. No mystic to my research recently.
I have no idea where I got the notion that she is a declared mystic! But I think I have read much about her stating that she was a mystic. Perhpas that is it, that I jumped to the conclusion (never the best of moves, jumping to conclusions!) that she was a declared mystic.

Blessings and regards…Barb

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Great post! Thank you for sharing! Reading those extracts really makes me want to get her autobiography again and much encouragement indeed in what you wrote. I was drawn to your words that holiness and sanctity may not be evident to anyone - this really does come out in another work by Jean Pierre de Caussade, although more laboured than the words of St. Therese, “Abandonment to Divine Providence”…although de Caussade does write of not only others not noticing, but oneself either in a very real and actual way that is terribly painful. And de Caussade rather states, to expect this and all the pain that goes with it. Mind you, Abandonment is not a morbid book at all…my poverty only if I have made it sound morbid! I just found it a fascinating concept that he does develop at one point…that though one desires to be a saint and strives mightily for holiness, the inner conviction remains painfully that one is very very far from anything even remotely approaching a saint and that one will never ever get anywhere near it. This is not really morbid at this moment I conclude (as I write this post reflectively) …it is an encouraging thought for those of us who do strive in every way and that goal just seems ever more distant always. That is why the concept fascinated me I can now insight.
St Therese especially towards the end of her life had extremely painful interior things to suffer and she was very ill at the time as well. The same incidentally applies to St. Faustina who was dying at the time she suffered much in an interior way.

Apologies, Trishie, but I could not discern if your last three paragraphs were your thoughts or those of JPII. Either way anyway, they are wonderfully encouraging and if they are your words, they are postively inspirational and encouragement. Inspired words.

One thing really caught my eye in the extract: "I didn’t think then that one had to suffer very much to reach sanctity, but God was not long in showing me this was so and in sending me the trials I have already mentioned.” …we can be assured that God would never send trials of any kind without the strength necessary to bear them well coming with them. And whatever God may send into our life, be it great joy or great suffering …or are a mixture of all levels of both, whatever…we can be assured that The Lord is sending sufficient into our lives to make very great saints of us. We can be very sure of that since His desire is to make every single last one of us great saints if we will only let Him. No exceptions whatsoever!

Do you happen to know, Trishie, if St. Therese is a declared mystic? I always thought she was but had to do some research for another thread and could not find any mention of her being declared by The Church “mystic”…she is declared a saint and Doctor of The Church only. No mystic to my research recently.
I have no idea where I got the notion that she is a declared mystic! But I think I have read much about her stating that she was a mystic. Perhpas that is it, that I jumped to the conclusion (never the best of moves, jumping to conclusions!) that she was a declared mystic.

Blessings and regards…Barb

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Great post! Thank you for sharing! Reading those extracts really makes me want to get her autobiography again and much encouragement indeed in what you wrote. I was drawn to your words that holiness and sanctity may not be evident to anyone - this really does come out in another work by Jean Pierre de Caussade, although more laboured than the words of St. Therese, “Abandonment to Divine Providence”…although de Caussade does write of not only others not noticing, but oneself either in a very real and actual way that is terribly painful. And de Caussade rather states, to expect this and all the pain that goes with it. Mind you, Abandonment is not a morbid book at all…my poverty only if I have made it sound morbid! I just found it a fascinating concept that he does develop at one point…that though one desires to be a saint and strives mightily for holiness, the inner conviction remains painfully that one is very very far from anything even remotely approaching a saint and that one will never ever get anywhere near it. This is not really morbid at this moment I conclude (as I write this post reflectively) …it is an encouraging thought for those of us who do strive in every way and that goal just seems ever more distant always. That is why the concept fascinated me I can now insight.
St Therese especially towards the end of her life had extremely painful interior things to suffer and she was very ill at the time as well. The same incidentally applies to St. Faustina who was dying at the time she suffered much in an interior way.

Apologies, Trishie, but I could not discern if these are your thoughts or those of JPII (all of which comes after "We draw hope from this saint of ‘the consecrated ordinary’, whom Pope John Paul 2 declared a Doctor of the Church on October 19, 1997."…to the end of your Post)… Either way anyway, they are wonderfully encouraging and if they are your words, they are postively inspirational and encouragement. Inspired words.

One thing really caught my eye in the extract: "I didn’t think then that one had to suffer very much to reach sanctity, but God was not long in showing me this was so and in sending me the trials I have already mentioned.” …we can be assured that God would never send trials of any kind without the strength necessary to bear them well coming with them. And whatever God may send into our life, be it great joy or great suffering …or are a mixture of all levels of both, whatever…we can be assured that The Lord is sending sufficient into our lives to make very great saints of us. We can be very sure of that since His desire is to make every single last one of us great saints if we will only let Him. No exceptions whatsoever!

Do you happen to know, Trishie, (or any other poster who may know) if St. Therese is a declared mystic? I always thought she was but had to do some research for another thread and could not find any mention of her being declared by The Church “mystic”…she is declared a saint and Doctor of The Church only. No mystic to my research recently. If she is a declared mystic, is there a link to a reputable Catholic source that states this please?
I have no idea where I got the notion that she is a declared mystic! But I think I have read much about her stating that she was a mystic. Perhpas that is it, that I jumped to the conclusion (never the best of moves, jumping to conclusions!) that she was a declared mystic.

Blessings and regards…Barb

 

[Trishie]

No Barb, Therese isn’t a declared mystic as far as I know. Maybe, but your sense of her as one feels right.
Yes, that quote was mine. No new research. I just lifted it out of my journal, ‘a handful of wildflowers’. Therese gets a mention in the first paragraph of my journal! Therese is my mentor, more than I realise I think. A lot of our generation of Catholics can probably say the same.

This journal is wildflower of my quest for God and for fruitful intercession and love of others. I recognise the subjective, limited nature of my search, except as God’s pursuit of me. No one is more aware of my limitations or of the fragility of my good intentions than are God and I.
Saint Therese of Lisieux, Carmelite contemplative nun, places my writings in perspective. “Believe me,” Therese told her sister Celine, “the writing of pious books, the composing of the most sublime poetry, all that does not equal the smallest act of self-denial.” Thus, a small act of love for others surpasses all effort of such pages as these. Yet however insignificant my journal, perhaps amid the verbiage someone may find a small handful of wildflowers.

I’ve not read “Abandonment to Divine Providence.” It sounds like a valuable resource.

And no, God doesn’t send suffering beyond the limit of the graces He offers, but He sure allows the boundaries to stretch sometimes! I guess He’s eager to expand the possiblities of our trust in Him because His love is so great. I don’t know if I feel joy? I feel blazing with love sometimes. Is that joy? I have a gift that is also a danger. I love so much sometimes that I get too easily and too quickly behind people’s defences. Sometimes that is enormously helpful, other times it’s unfair to them. I pray for discernment but don’t always get it right. I’ve never actually stated that previously. You draw things out of us, BarbaraTherese.

God bless, Trishie

 

[nice2000]

“God deliver
***me from sad-faced Saints.” ***
(St. Teresa of Avila)

http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/fatherpius/carme_pict0.jpeg
St. Therese of Lisieux

Sense of Humour in St. Therese of Lisieux
Father Pius Edwin Sammut
Discalced Carmelite
HERE

From a talk on Therese’s humor
given at the 1997 OCDS Congress
in Long Island.
By…Father Steven Payne, O.C.D***.***
HERE

---

I really enjoyed reading about this Saint.

Thanks for sharing.

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Just acknowledging your Posts, Trishie and Nice2000. I will get back and reply to you…I have near chaos here to try and straighten out which is simply the reflection of a true control freak, which I am!! Rest assured I will come back and as a ‘very happy chappy’ having the complete illusion that things here are under control and reply to you both.
Blessings and my regards…barb

 

[the_phoenix]

Thanks for this thread which helps show that St. Therese of Lisieux was in fact a three-dimensional person.

All the attention that most people put on St. Therese as “the Little Flower” and all the roses tends to scare off people like me who just for some reason cannot get into the whole flowery, sentimental, warm-and-fuzzy, touchy-feely kind of thing. I’ve recently prayed that maybe St. Therese and I could be friends, and added quickly, but no flowers please!

Maybe this means that I should instead keep to saints who have a more compatible “chemistry,” but I’ve heard that St. Therese of Lisieux did indeed have a finely insightful intellectual poetic mind, patience to help an infirm grumbling sister while hearing far-off party music, and I was also swayed in her favor on seeing a photograph of her dressed up in costume as St. Joan of Arc.

A sense of humor / sense of reality, being a “real person” like you’re describing St. Therese in this thread is helpful too.

~~ the phoenix

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Just acknowledging your Posts, Trishie and Nice2000. I will get back and reply to you…I have near chaos here to try and straighten out which is simply the reflection of a true control freak, which I am!! Rest assured I will come back and as a ‘very happy chappy’ having the complete illusion that things here are under control and reply to you both.
Blessings and my regards…barb

I overlooked the above…apologies!

Quoting Nice:
I really enjoyed reading about this Saint.

Thanks for sharing.

---

… …
Deo Gratius

Quoting Trishie

No Barb, Therese isn’t a declared mystic as far as I know. Maybe, but your sense of her as one feels right.
Yes, that quote was mine. No new research. I just lifted it out of my journal, ‘a handful of wildflowers’. Therese gets a mention in the first paragraph of my journal! Therese is my mentor, more than I realise I think. A lot of our generation of Catholics can probably say the same.

Hi Trishie……………The prayers you write are very beautiful!..I won’t be stating that St. Therese is a declared mystic in future, as I am starting to think that I have been wrong and there is no such official classification by The Church at all . I think you are right and many Catholics of this generation are encouraged and inspired by the life of St. Therese: who did only the ordinary, but in extra ordinary ways (quote from something I have read somewhere)

This journal is wildflower of my quest for God and for fruitful intercession and love of others. I recognise the subjective, limited nature of my search, except as God’s pursuit of me. No one is more aware of my limitations or of the fragility of my good intentions than are God and I.
Saint Therese of Lisieux, Carmelite contemplative nun, places my writings in perspective. “Believe me,” Therese told her sister Celine, “the writing of pious books, the composing of the most sublime poetry, all that does not equal the smallest act of self-denial.” Thus, a small act of love for others surpasses all effort of such pages as these. Yet however insignificant my journal, perhaps amid the verbiage someone may find a small handful of wildflowers.

These exchanges between Therese and sisters, and I think from letters? sound truly inspirational. And while an acclaimed and great work of some kind of religious nature cannot equal one little act of self denial done for love of God and/or neighbour for the love of God, The Lord still wants at times these great works of say religious literature to be carried out and we have many. We labour away ato whatever we may be called, and without reflecting on where it may be in the ‘scale of things’…this is the great beauty to me of St. Therese. She never looked beyond the ordinary duties of an ordinary Carmelite, but she carried them out in extra ordinary ways and became a great saint indeed. I like to think that when (long after being declared a saint) The Church made her a Doctor of The Church, it is sort of like The Church saying “go ye and do likewise”.
In Carmel and I suppose in some foundations even still, when a sister dies, a small article is written and most often re her outstanding qualities. When Therese was very ill, the prioress realized that *she had nothing at all outstanding to write about Therese (speaking to the humanly-hidden nature of the saintly interior life of St. Therese)*and so asked her to write her life story…or we probably would not have a St. Therese. With your great love for St. Therese, am sure you know these things! The Lord is always at work providing, and sometimes most strangely.

I’ve not read “Abandonment to Divine Providence.” It sounds like a valuable resource.

It is to me for sure, while recognizing that it may not therefore appeal to all. Not long ago I came across a very small book about 3half” x 4half” that fits neatly into the bag and are small chapters on various spiritual realities, Divine Providence and abandoning oneself to The Lord’s Providence and with great trust,total surrender and enduring confidence: “Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence” by Jean Baptiste Saint Jure and St. Claude de La Colembiere………both Jesuits. (TAN Books & Publishers) Handy to carry round and read when waiting anywhere.

And no, God doesn’t send suffering beyond the limit of the graces He offers, but He sure allows the boundaries to stretch sometimes! I guess He’s eager to expand the possiblities of our trust in Him because His love is so great. I don’t know if I feel joy? I feel blazing with love sometimes. Is that joy? I have a gift that is also a danger. I love so much sometimes that I get too easily and too quickly behind people’s defences. Sometimes that is enormously helpful, other times it’s unfair to them. I pray for discernment but don’t always get it right. I’ve never actually stated that previously. You draw things out of us, BarbaraTherese.

Smiled at “(The Lord) sure allows the boundaries to stretch sometimes” …sometimes one can have pause to ponder and wonder , but no in the final and real analysis we are never tried beyond our means for God always sends with difficulty or suffering, for example, the Grace to bear it and to the point of sanctity and holiness. To blaze with love is a great gift for sure! Joy can be a strange thing I think. One can be truly suffering in every way and greatly and yet in the will there is Peace and Joy to be enduring the cross and knowing it is of God……… but not actually felt - Joy I mean - (although it can be, and another great gift). If one in suffering feels Peace and Joy then I think this is a consolation and the suffering is somewhat diminished. When Peace and Joy reside in the will, there is a real Peace and Joy midst all the suffering humanly without diminishing it, knowing that the suffering does come from Divine Providence providing for all things. There is a Peace like this too, that resides in the will but not necessarily felt…Peace and Joy walk hand in hand I think. There can be times too and for The Lord’s own reasons…we can be disturbed, anxious and confused - feeling suffering deeply and intensely in every way - and Peace and Joy seem dreams from the past…and this state of great interior suffering is every much a gift of The Lord as any gift that we recognize perhaps more easily and with clarity as a clear gift from God.

The exquisite perfume and oils of Divine Providence precedes and enfolds ever single moment of our life and in the great and the small, in the wondrous and in the cross! God is always and forever and in all things absolutely and totally regardless of anything whatsoever drawing us to Himself and hence of course to holiness and sanctity. This is the basic concept in the theology of Divine Providence. The Lord even has good and profitable use for our faults and failings, and making for our holiness and sanctification.

Blessings and regards…Barb

 

[BarbaraTherese]

Thanks for this thread which helps show that St. Therese of Lisieux was in fact a three-dimensional person.

All the attention that most people put on St. Therese as “the Little Flower” and all the roses tends to scare off people like me who just for some reason cannot get into the whole flowery, sentimental, warm-and-fuzzy, touchy-feely kind of thing. I’ve recently prayed that maybe St. Therese and I could be friends, and added quickly, but no flowers please!

Maybe this means that I should instead keep to saints who have a more compatible “chemistry,” but I’ve heard that St. Therese of Lisieux did indeed have a finely insightful intellectual poetic mind, patience to help an infirm grumbling sister while hearing far-off party music, and I was also swayed in her favor on seeing a photograph of her dressed up in costume as St. Joan of Arc.

A sense of humor / sense of reality, being a “real person” like you’re describing St. Therese in this thread is helpful too.

~~ the phoenix

Hi there Phoenix…as that saying goes “different strokes for different folks”. God has created every single one of us totally and wholly unique…each of us is a “one off” and never ever to be repeated - the mould is destroyed, as it were. Hence how precious and to be treasured is our being and all that comes with it and with great wonderment I think…even likes and dislikes.

Hence what may appeal, even call, to one does not for some reason appeal nor call to another and The Lord has His reasons. Sometimes on first acquaintance with something we are not at all drawn or moved…and then later down the line for some reason we are indeed drawn or moved. Sometimes we may never be drawn and moved for all time…whatever - all is in God’s hands hence as Julian of Norwhich wrote, and another mystic:
All is well
All is well
And all manner of things shall be well.

“In my Father’s House there are many mansions, I go to prepare a place for you”…and there is that great doctrine of St. Paul of The Mystical Body - and more or less pointing out what if an eye wanted to speak…or an ear wanted to smell? This logic, and logic it is as theology always reflects sound logic, can be quite easily extended to many matters. We each have our unique call and direction never to be precisely repeated. All is well and shall be well.

“Never be afraid to experience reality from your own ground of being.” I think I read that in a psychology book somewhere…but then The Holy Spirit is neither bigot, nor prejudiced, confined nor selective, and is all embracing, often revealing Himself in (to us) what may seem like a very strange places.

All the attention that most people put on St. Therese as “the Little Flower” and all the roses tends to scare off people like me who just for some reason cannot get into the whole flowery, sentimental, warm-and-fuzzy, touchy-feely kind of thing. I’ve recently prayed that maybe St. Therese and I could be friends, and added quickly, but no flowers please!

An example of experiencing reality from your own ground of being…and hence spiritually, humanly, theologically valid and meaningful, a gift. God is drawing you in a different direction perhaps to the many through reality (matters connected to St. Therese)meeting your own ground of being…

God bless…regards…Barb

 

[GemmaRose]

Thank you BarbaraTherese for this delightful glimpse into the wholesome humanity of this young saint. I am charmed by Fr Payne’s talk drawn partly from Fr Pius Edwin’s text. Thank you for sharing it.

I have long felt disapointed that the gospels never specifically say, “Jesus laughed”. We can sometimes infer or interpret some event in such a way that we detect humour in the way Jesus spoke. However, I do wish the dear writers of the gospels might have said, “Jesus laughed”, as clearly as it was stated, “Jesus wept” (for instance, over the death of Lazarus) (John 11, v.35/36). I can’t doubt that in His healthy emotional life and wholesome human relationships, Jesus’ laugh rang cheerfully to others’ ears. I simply believe that it would have been enlightening for followers who may have felt goodness and holiness is a deadly serious business.
Regarding holiness

Dear Jesus, please reveal brilliantly to all, that You do not require that individuals need to be regarded as Saints, in order to be Your saints. Assure them that holiness is Your action, not ours! Let them read the gospels and reflect on what they read, discovering that You were truly human, that you wept, felt pain, joy, and exasperation, “How long do I have to put up with this faithless generation!”) [Mark 9:19]

You became angry [in the Temple]. You were sometimes disappointed, sometimes weary. You felt the need to be alone, and the desire to escape a dreadful ordeal (“let this cup pass from me”). [Luke 22:42] Then in the depths of suffering, You found faith difficult, (“My God, why have You abandoned me?”) [Psalm 22:1]

Why did not the evangelists record Your laughter! How sober of them! However, they do record as Your lyrical delight over little children, (“Blessed are You, Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth! You have revealed to little ones, the mysteries of Your Kingdom!” [Matthew 11:25]

Jesus, ask Your people to observe that You lived the ordinary life for about thirty years. If You had not wanted to make such an issue about being vulnerably human, You could have come as a glorious, fully developed human Personage.

Jesus, truly human, truly God, pray for us, that we may live humanly wholesome and thus holy lives.

Trishie. St Therese, dear, delightful soul, please intercede for us.
Bless you for sharing Your insights, BarbaraTherese!

I have a book, St Teresa and Friendship, which is a wonderful glimpse into St Teresa of Avila/Jesus’ wholesome friendships

Dear Trishie,

There is one spot in the Gospels where if you close your eyes and meditate upon it, you can see Jesus saying something tongue-in-cheek, and most probably even laughing thereafter.

Here is the passage from Mark 7:

24 He left that place and set out for the territory of Tyre. There he went into a house and did not want anyone to know he was there; but he could not pass unrecognised. 25 At once a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit heard about him and came and fell at his feet. 26 Now this woman was a gentile, by birth a Syro-Phoenician, and she begged him to drive the devil out of her daughter. 27 And he said to her, ‘The children should be fed first, because it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to little dogs.’ 28 But she spoke up, ‘Ah yes, sir,’ she replied, ‘but little dogs under the table eat the scraps from the children.’ 29 And he said to her, ‘For saying this you may go home happy; the devil has gone out of your daughter.’ 30 So she went off home and found the child lying on the bed and the devil gone.

New Jerusalem Bible

I remember always being horrified that our beloved Jesus would call this woman a dog until I attended a retreat given by renowned Scripture scholar, Fr. Donald Senior, C.P.

He explained that in the language of the time, there were two words for “dog.” One, which would have been insulting to call a human being, meant the bothersome, mangy, stray dog of the street or countryside. The other word for “dog” meant the beloved family pet.

It was this second word for dog which Jesus used. He said this to her to test her faith and to acknowledge that the Jews had “dibs” on Jesus’ ministry.

I can imagine Jesus saying this with a twinkle in His eye, and the woman fully understanding that He was not insulting her. With her response, she acknowledges her position: She wasn’t a Jew, i.e., the family sitting at the table, but in what can only be a profound divinely inspired insight, she understood that Jesus came to save us all, Gentiles and Jews, which is basically what her answer meant.

I can envision Jesus throwing back His head and laughing with pleasure in her faith in Him, her openness to divine inspiration, her trust that He would heal her daughter, His amazement that she understood Him and was bold enough to answer Him as she did.

I imagine the sunlight glistening off His hair as He had a hearty laugh with her… and He tells her to go home happy… HAPPY, not thankful or grateful or faithful, but HAPPY.

I only wish I knew as much about Scripture and the ancient languages as Fr. Don knows… maybe there are other such places in the Gospels which show the humorous side of Jesus.

As for St. Therese:heart: , anyone who can be so holy and can get to be a Saint by, basically, doing laundry… well, she’s my kind of Saint!

Gemma is still my favorite Saint, but Therese runs a VERY close second!