Discalced Carmelites

St. Thérèse of Lisieux

Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, the Little Flower, was born Marie-Françoise-Thérèse Martin in Alençon, France, on 2 January 1873, the youngest of the five daughters of Louis Martin and Marie Zélie Guérin, both canonized. Her mother died when she was four, and she was a sensitive, easily distressed child until, at Christmas 1874, she was given the strength she had outgrown and began to mature quickly. At fifteen she entered the Carmel of Lisieux and was professed in 1890. There she found what she called her little way: not great deeds but small duties done in love, the patience with a difficult sister, the smile offered when she would rather be left alone, the trust of a child who climbs a stair one step at a time. At her Prioress's obedience she wrote her autobiography, The Story of a Soul, which has been read by countless souls since as a plain road to heaven. Tuberculosis wasted her last eighteen months, and she died on 30 September 1897, saying she would spend her heaven doing good on earth. She was canonized in 1925, declared patroness of the missions in 1927, and named a Doctor of the Church in 1997.

Patronage · Missions; missionaries; florists