Fr Vincent Stapleton writes to the 'Little Flower'

MOST ILLUSTRIOUS ST. THERESE OF LISIEUX

Dear little flower,
You promised to spend your heaven doing good on earth. So I am writing to you asking for your guidance, your prayer and your help for all of us who are still here below.

You lived in the last part of the 19th century. To paraphrase a famous song – ‘Well, St. Therese, you know, if you’re looking below, its worse now than then.’ Many people are finding the never-ending litany of problems and scandals and crises that we face to be very trying and really testing their faith and quality of life.

In 1997, on the 100th anniversary of your heavenly birthday, Pope John Paul II declared you to be a doctor of the Church. What he was hinting at is that we still have so much to learn from you – especially your little way to God … the way of trust and love.

Here is the crux of the matter: it is very easy to trust and smile when everything is rosy. There is little virtue in cycling a bike downhill. It is precisely when things are going haywire and we are struggling – then trust and love are the path to a constructive way out of our crises. Unfortunately, the temptation to fear is very great.

Countless soldiers, in the hell of the trenches in World War I, carried pictures, relics and medals of you. They placed their trust in your intercession. Having survived the war, they returned to Lisieux in great numbers or wrote letters to your Carmelite sisters testifying that you saved them in the war.

Then there is Edith Piaf, who went on to become a famous singer, cured at the age of 7 from blindness, after a pilgrimage to your grave.

Can we forget the murderer Pranzini for whom you prayed so earnestly? He showed no signs of repentance. But as he mounted the gallows, unexpectedly, he kissed the crucifix three times – a sign that God’s mercy had indeed reached him through your prayers.

I am often tempted to think that only something huge and heroic will turn things around for our Church and for the faith in Ireland. But you remind us always of the little way. God does not demand great deeds from us – especially if they make us proud and self-assured. He is our Father and we are his children. You teach us that what is necessary is to remain as little children before him and to trust.

It is not first by keeping commandments that we have to ‘earn’ God’s good graces. No! First, we are transformed inwardly by God’s freely given love … by the encounter with Jesus … and then trusting in his love for us, we become channels of that love to other people. We are given the strength to reflect God’s image.

The little way is a genuine path to holiness, as Fr. Jacque Philippe tells us, accessible to everyone – so that no one can get discouraged, not even the littlest, poorest or most sinful.

Let us meet discouragement and fear with trust and love, not condemnation.
Dear Therese, saint so beloved, your life is a testimony to the fact that trust chosen, and courage acted on – in small ways – can shake the whole world.

Pray for us that we can revive our courage and our love.
Adieu.

Fr Vincent Stapleton is a native of Borrisoleigh and is currently Rector of St Joseph and St Brigid’s Church, Bóthar na Naomh, Thurles.