St. Therese, AKA the little Flower, wrote an autobiography when she was dying of TB, as a memoir for her older sister.Only the first three chapters are available at present.
The first part is a charming picture of the stodgy but loving middle class family in France at the end of the 1800's, as told by a young girl.
But as she grows, the book shows the young girl, unable to serve God by doing "great deeds" due to sexism and due to poor health and limited talents, instead discovers that she can serve God by doing little things out of love, making each little action a prayer. Later, she enters a convent and dies of TB at a young age, but her biography is so down to earth that she quickly became a favorite of the lay people, everyone from Edith Piaf to missionaries.
No mysticism or feel good stuff here: just ordinary things that ordinary folks can do ...and believe me, it's a lot easier to say oom or feel "spiritual" than to hold one's tongue...or clean the bathroom as a prayer. (and yes, I know that the great masters of Zen point out the same thing).
For non believers, it can be seen as a biography of women who had few opportunities to be great due to sexism...but since she was barred from the journey to great deeds in the outside world, she substituted the journey within...
MariaLectrix Blog is carrying it in podcast mode...
No comments:
Post a Comment