"Jesus, King of love, may the reign of Your love be deeply rooted in the hearts of priests."
     --prayer taught by Jesus, King of love to little Marcel Van, spiritual brother of St. Therese of the Child Jesus, on the Feast of Christ the King, 28 October 1945

From Conversations (with Jesus, Mary, and St. Therese) by Servant of God Marcel Van
translated from the Vietnamese into French by Fr. Anthony Boucher, CSsR, (Bearded Jesus)
translated from the French into English by Jack Keogan, BFF (Best Friend Forever)

28 October 1945
(Feast of Christ the King)

Marcel: Jesus, today on the feast of Your universal kingship, I ask that You reign in the hearts of all men. Does that please You? That's all I know how to say. I cannot find anything better.

Jesus: You will repeat this prayer throughout today: "Jesus, King of love, may the reign of Your love be deeply rooted in the hearts of priests."
            The work I expect of my spouse is that she will go in search of souls. Even if this gives you a lot of pain in writing all the words that I am dictating to you and praying all your life in order to save a single soul and offering it to Me, I will welcome this soul with all My heart as I would do for a million other souls who would come back suddenly to Me. My little apostle, never allow yourself to be afraid by the effort that you must impose on yourself to write. Even if the words I am saying to you were useful only to a single soul, that would already be sufficient.
            The behavior of My spouses in their relations with Me must also be the same in their relations with My Mother. Mary, being My Mother, and My spouses being but one with Me, it follows that My Mother is equally the Mother of My spouses. It seems, however, that many of My spouses show evidence of indifference towards My Mother. Little friend, listen carefully to what I am going to say to You: do not be distracted. It is thanks to Mary that My spouses can unite themselves to My love in an intimate and lasting fashion. My little friend, never forget it: you must love My Mother just as I love her Myself.

Marcel: Jesus, are You sad sometimes because of me?

Jesus: My child, if that ever happens it is only when I see you sad. When you are happy, how could I be sad? So, be happy always. A single one of your joys suffices to console me very much.

Marcel: Jesus, does it ever happen that I cause You pain?

Jesus: Why not? Nevertheless, your negligences are like grains of dust in My eyes which tarnish your soul a little, but which disappear completely as soon as they have passed through the fire of My love. That is why I said to you: "The soul which burns interiorly by the fire of My love is always white with purity in My eyes."

Marcel: Jesus, my sister Saint Therese gives You the name of banker.

[In St. Therese's Letter 142, 6 July 1893 to Celine: "Your Therese is not in the best of form at the moment but Jesus teaches her, 'to profit from all the good and the bad that she finds in herself.' He teaches her to play at the bank of love, or rather, no, He plays for her without telling her how. He does so because that is His business and not Therese's; what concerns her is to abandon herself, to give herself without holding anything back, not even the pleasure of knowing how much the bank yields to her."]

Marcel continues: So, do men confide to You many spiritual treasures every day? I love You a lot, dear Jesus, and my only wish is to confide huge spiritual treasures to You every day, while asking You to distribute them to souls. I admit that my spiritual goods have neither any importance nor any worth; but be happy, however, to accept them since that is all I possess. I know that, already, You understand me very well without my having to speak to You of it.

Jesus: Little child of My love, listen to Me. In truth the tabernacle in which I reside resembles a telegraph room where news from everywhere arrives continually. And I, like the chief telegrapher, I must stay there all the time, always listening. News comes to Me every day, some sad, some happy; and although the latter are often of no consequence, they are still able to please Me to such an extent as to make Me forget all the bad news.
            Let us suppose that news from sinners comes to My ears from everywhere; some blaspheme My love, others address hard reproaches to Me and speak all the evil they can of Me. But if at the same time the words of My spouses come to Me from diverse places, these words make Me forget all the blasphemies, they even make me forget to punish the sin of the blasphemers. As if under the spell of a charm, I am unaware that they have offended Me, so that I give to them all the graces of which My hands are full. My child, do you know what these words are which charm Me so much? They are none other than parcels of sighs of love which are sent to Me by My spouses. This is fortunate for sinners since, if I had not received these words making My heart happy, I would have chastised them already. 

*   *   *

I dare not turn the page of my well-loved (second copy) of Conversations lest I tire you or we forget (as I already half have) all that Jesus has said so far! O Love! How is it possible that You are full of so much Love? You are Love, Your beloved Apostle John has told us this - and yet, and yet . . . How is Love so full of Love? We have not known Love! We have not known You! We have no clue as to the infinite treasures and depths of Your compassion, Your tenderly solicitous attention to us, Your delight in our nothingness, Your salvific use of the least of our sighs - all of which are sighs of love, because what else is there in this silly valley of tears and occasional laughter?

Dear reader, if you have read this far you have read that "A single one of your joys suffices to console Me very much." Your joy consoles Jesus, that is, but I assure you it consoles me too! Think of the laughter of a baby, a child, a teenager, a twenty-something, a young married couple, and so on up to the laughter of an elderly person. I can think of the laughter of my 87 year old mom and my nearly 94 year old mother-in-law. Oh how their laughter makes me laugh too! My mom is a bit forgetful, and my mother-in-law, in contrast, has a memory to beat all - but neither of these matters of memory matter when we are laughing together. Joy, like love, conquers all and emerges triumphant in the bright sunshine or on a cloudy day, in the wee hours of the night or early hours of the morning, amidst stars and moonlight, or even in the seemingly darkest of places. 

I read something recently that got me almost reconciled, almost understanding, almost happy about suffering. And then, thanks be to God, I forgot what I read. For the life of me I can't remember where or what I read that gave me this happy realization that the Cross is not our mortal enemy. 

Don't get me wrong - if Jesus is on that cross, I accept it. But it would be a bit much to say, as I was about to, "If Jesus is on that cross, I am content." No, not exactly content. Wriggling and restless, longing for a hot chocolate with marshmallows or a more comfortable outfit or some warm socks on my cold feet, and on and on . . . 

And I'm kind of relieved that I've forgotten why we can be, at least hypothetically, theoretically, and in the depths of our will if not at the top of our game, happy about suffering. Because if I lost my lament of "Woe is me - I HATE THE CROSS!" where would my charming relatability be?

There must be other blogs or online sites or books to read by Saints who champion the glory of the Cross. There are lots of big people who love Jesus very much. But I am here to represent the little ones, to speak as a little one to little ones, to speak for St. Therese, and because she got BIG in Heaven, to speak for her little spiritual brother, the Servant of God Marcel Van who is not even venerable - well, sorry Marcel, I mean there is venerable, and there is Venerable, and in both senses (aged and worthy of our piety or having had one's heroic virtues acknowledged by the Church and thus entitled to the name Venerable), you aren't there yet!

Thank You, Jesus, that our dear brother Marcel remains little even while he helps our sister Therese shower those innumerable roses that the angels keep handing them from the no doubt very beautiful and sparkly buckets of roses they have in Heaven. Because where would we little ones be without our fearful leader Marcel? (Okay, now he's fearless, but when he was in exile, he was often quite fearful and yet still hilarious because You, Jesus, were there to comfort him.)

Where would we be without Marcel since we find it so much trouble to believe Therese - and, holy smokes, may You forbid it - we often have trouble believing, or perhaps it's trouble remembering, even YOU, dear Love - telling us that littleness is The Key to Your Heart, the Key that opens the doors of the Kingdom, the Key to Heaven. I'm such a bad Protestant, always forgetting, or better yet never having known Chapter and Verse, but didn't You say quite authoritatively that "Unless one becomes like a little child, one cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven"? That question mark ruins the effect, but yes, You did! And then Therese repeated Your teaching by her life and doctrine, and she confirms this Little Way now by her Shower of Roses upon us . . . but it is Marcel Van, the littlest Redemptorist brother, the complaining, teasing, laughing and crying Marcel who lives out this littleness before our eyes when we read Your Conversations with him.

But let's stop yammering (that would be me), and get to the point:

Marcel: Jesus, are You sad sometimes because of Me?

Jesus: My child, if that ever happens it is only when I see you sad. When you are happy, how could I be sad? So, be happy always. A single one of your joys suffices to console Me very much.

I knew that. I had read those words a hundred times over a four year period, and still depression and anxiety and insomnia descended upon me and seemed to well up from within me, and they didn't finally leave for two whole years. Then thanks to the love of God and His angels (earthly and heavenly), and thanks to miracles and a big Miracle around the Feast of the Assumption this year, all that is past and I am joyful again. Full of renewed energy (please pray for those in my path - it is hard not to knock them down on my way to fulfill all of Therese's little tasks for me), full of laughter, and grateful for what turns out to be a freedom from fear that I want to say I've never experienced before, but I might more truly say I've rarely experienced before. 

So. Why do I tell you all this?

Because if you find yourself wishing you could follow Jesus' advice and simply "Be happy always," thus making not only yourself and those around you happy, but making Jesus Himself happy (and this is our goal, after all) - and not even by any mortification, but simply by enjoying that ice cream cone or glass of wine (to each his own, I say!)(and there is absolutely NO accounting for taste, that's for sure) . . . but if amidst this desire to be happy for the sake of yourself and the universe, not to mention because Jesus just requested it of you (Oh glory be! - who could not love these Conversations between Jesus and Marcel?), as I say if amidst this desire to be happy you find yourself just as humdrum, ho hum, or even down in the dumps as any person might feel in this Valley of Tears (I hate to harp on the tears business, but in my experience it isn't called a Valley of Tears for nothin) - well, I get it. And I want to say this: Please don't feel guilty about it. If you could make yourself happy, you would! But you can't, only God can, so let me pray for you, and feel free to pray with me -

Jesus, we trust in You! Please accept every single one of our sighs (even if they start out sounding like sighs of annoyance or frustration or anger or every other type of sigh) as sighs of love that will charm You and make You forget all the blasphemies and forget to punish sins, and let our sighs submerge You in joy so that You will be unaware of offenses against You and give to the whole world all the graces of which Your hands are full!

And then, when You have had enough of pretending that our sighs of ennui and our sighs of upset are sighs of love, please miraculously turn our every breath into a sigh of love and then - THEN! - give us some of those kisses we've read about - You know, like, "Let Him kiss me with the kisses of His mouth" - and then may these kisses cheer us up so that we forget our sorrows and have plenty of joys to cheer You in return, to console You as You promised Marcel a single one of our joys would!

We are fast approaching Advent, which means we are fast approaching Christmas, and a new dear friend cracked me up by talking (two weeks ago or so) about the next six weeks and how she was dreading them. What? A million things to do? And then the added pressure that we are the cognoscenti and if we don't live Advent as a season of penance, who will?

Okay, I need to wrap this up so you can have your cupcake or wine, your snuggle under a warm blanket or your trip to the beach (depending where you are as you read this!) - and here is the scoop:

1. Happy Feast of Christ the King! To those in Virginia who taught me to love this feast so much (and I thank you with tears in my eyes) - and to those everywhere who would like to learn to love this feast, I can only sing: To Jesus Christ, our Sov'reign King, Who is the world's salvation, All praise and homage do we bring, And thanks and adoration!

2. May your Advent be a season of joy! It may also be a season of shopping (penance and joy), a season of preparation (for meals and parties as well as for the coming of Jesus to our hearts once again), and a season of sighs - you don't even need me to explain those in a parenthetical remark - and let's admit it is unlikely to be a season of silence, but I pray now asking the intercession of our Blessed Mother and our guardian angels, Padre Pio and his angel, Saints Raphael, Gabriel and Michael, and St. Juliana: Dear Jesus, grant us a holy hour, just one holy hour if not more, in this coming Advent, a holy hour where we might exchange hearts with You and find ourselves in the womb of Mary with You, waiting Your first breath of the air You created . . . Thank You, little King of Love, for coming down for us! Thank You for everything, and may this Advent above all be a season of JOY because You, little Jesus, King of all hearts, can't resist visiting us again right in the thick of things. Thank You, Love, for Advent hymns and Christmas carols, and if they are all mixed up over the next several weeks, let us sing them with equal amounts of nostalgia and anticipation, earnestness and childish delight like Yours.

3. Meanwhile, we were saying a novena, and I forgot all about it - thank goodness we said Little Flower in this hour show your power 9 times in a row!

4. Because now we have a new novena! By all that is joyful and good, here in the Santa Barbara region of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, today we have a new Polish bishop, Sławomir Szkredka, being installed at a Mass at San Buenaventura Mission. A friend who loves novenas even more than I do (impossible, you say! But don't forget: with God all things are possible!) wrote: "I was thinking it would be beautiful if we could say a novena together for Bishop "Swavek" as he begins his ministry here, starting on his first day. He'll have a challenging task, and the possibility to do much good -- let's help our new shepherd out with our prayers! Bishop Swavek has a devotion to St. John Paul II and is being installed at the last mission founded by St. Junipero Serra. So we're praying specially to those two great saints for his ministry here."

Well, this dear praying friend then wrote: "Please share with anyone you think would like to join in praying for our new bishop!" And so, here is our prayer for those who would like to pray even for a moment with us for the newest bishop in the Church!

Dear Lord, through the intercession of Our Lady, St. John Paul II, and St. Junipero Serra, we ask for Your special blessing on Bishop Sławomir.

Almighty and everlasting God, have mercy upon Your servant our Bishop Sławomir, and order his goings according to Your mercy in the paths of eternal salvation, that by the gift of Your grace he may ever seek such things as to please You and with all his strength to lead his flock along the path of salvation. Give him a spirit of courage and right judgment, a spirit of knowledge and love. By governing with fidelity those entrusted to his care, may he at last share with them in the joy of seeing Your face forever in your Kingdom.

Mary, mother of the Church, pray for us.
St. Joseph, pray for us.
St. John Paul II, pray for us.
St. Junipero Serra, pray for us.
St. Bonaventure, pray for us.
St. Barbara, pray for us.

Draw me, we will run!!!

"Jesus does not ask great actions from us, but simply surrender and gratitude." (Story of a Soul)

"After my death, I will let fall a shower of roses. I will spend my heaven doing good upon earth." (Therese to her sisters)

"What most draws down graces from our dear Lord is gratitude, for if we thank Him for a gift, He is touched and hastens to give us ten more, and if we thank Him again with the same sincerity, what an incalculable multiplication of graces! I have experienced this: try it and you will see. My gratitude is for all He gives me is boundless, and I prove this to Him in a thousand ways." (Therese to Celine)

How was your Thanksgiving?
I hope it was lovely, but if it had regrettable moments, or if you are just plum wore out, let's set all that aside and start fresh . . . Did you know that Jesus does not ask great actions from us, but just surrender and gratitude? And even for little tiny souls, surrender and gratitude are possible! 

In our last episode we were saying a novena to Therese for all priests, bishops, and the Holy Father, and all our intentions, and we finished on or around St. Raphael Kalinowski's feast on November 19, hidden behind the Sunday, or November 20, as it is celebrated in Poland.

Well despite my hopes to write a post for the end of that novena and more fun anecdotes about St. Raphael (who apologized to the Carmel of Lisieux in 1902 for having doubted their little sister Therese and the universality of her message, and then proceeded to make amends by getting her Story of a Soul translated into Polish), what mostly happened this week was shopping. The grocery store on Monday. Trader Joe's on Tuesday. Costco on Wednesday . . . and now, before I know it, Thanksgiving is over and I've got a new slate of prayer intentions - well some old and some new.

There's nothing quite as dear as the old, familiar prayer intention - like wrapping ourselves in a warm blanket we can snuggle up to Jesus' merciful Heart, immerse ourselves in HIs Mercy, and as if we're doing all this in a dimly lit bar we can't stop returning to despite ourselves, we can say to Jesus the Divine Bartender, "I'll have the usual!"

And then, just when we think He Who knows our intentions and hearts and hurts so well has gone majorly deaf, He will hand us what we're asking for - the miracle we've been seeking for years. A father-in-law who allows Jesus to come to him after 60 plus years apart . . . the brother we pray will return to the Church and the sacraments becomes entirely converted in the Heart of the Church in Thailand . . . that "character defect" we've been struggling with for years is suddenly removed by Him in the blink of an eye . . . a child we love who has been suffering is healed . . . the cross that seems to crush us is at last and with great sweetness lifted and tossed to the ends of the earth while Jesus stays with us to make sure we're okay after all . . . we wake up one morning to find a renewed joy and energy and lo and behold, the sun is shining again!

All things are possible with God, and so when you wake up to remember that your cross is still waiting for you or a new one has been delivered faster than amazon or Domino's could manage it, don't despair, simply take Therese at her word and God at His . . .

Let's ask, so we will receive! Let's say together right now, "Jesus, I trust in You, Jesus, thank You for everything!" and then let's turn to the saint of His Heart, the Little Flower who promised to fill our lives with flowers, who promised to Come Down (not just watch over and help from Heaven but really come right down into the thick of it beside us). 

We can say the short version of our novena to her:

Little Flower in this hour show your power!

Or we can give it the longer version:

O Little Therese of the Child Jesus
Please pick for me a rose from the heavenly garden
and send it to me as a message of love.

O Little Flower of Jesus,
please ask God to grant the favors I now place with confidence in your hands . . . that all our priests, bishops, and the Holy Father may become great saints,
and for all the intentions we hold in our hearts.

St. Therese, help me to always believe as you did,
in God’s great love for me,
so that I may imitate your “Little Way” each day.
Amen.

There!
We're already a ninth of the way there, and if you fear you'll forget, let's make it a Mother Teresa "do it now" St. Therese novena - 


Little Flower in this hour show your power!

Little Flower in this hour show your power!

Little Flower in this hour show your power!

Little Flower in this hour show your power!

Little Flower in this hour show your power!

Little Flower in this hour show your power!

Little Flower in this hour show your power!

Little Flower in this hour show your power!

Little Flower in this hour show your power!

Amen!

I'm going to try and keep going for another eight days, and that will be for your intentions as well as mine! That will take us to . . . the Vigil of St. Francis Xavier, if I've done my finger counting right!

Meanwhile, speaking of feasts and Saints, that imp Marcel from whom we take our name (that would be Marcel Van, but while I'm thinking of it, let's toss into our novena all the other Marcels we can think of - just sharing the name of our sweet brother is a grace for them, and may it bring them on his coattails - or rather on the tail of his too tight soutane - straight to Heaven into Jesus' loving eternal "My turn!" From mimes to priests to a freshmen at my alma mater, though she's a Marceline, may we who bear his name be blessed with gratitude and surrender!) - wow, that was a long parentheses, but now that we're out, let's get back to the point - that imp Marcel almost let me forget it's the day of his compatriots today!

Happy feast of St. Andrew Dũng Lạc, and his companions, Martyrs. The Vatican tells us: "A young convert and priest gives his name to a group of 117 martyrs of his land, courageous witnesses to Christ whose blood was the seed of the Church in Vietnam. Their collective feast day is celebrated on November 24." And just for the record, they were martyred in the years 1850 to 1852.

Our friends at Franciscan Media have told their story this way for us:

Andrew Dung-Lac, a Catholic convert ordained to the priesthood, was one of 117 people martyred in Vietnam between 1820 and 1862. Members of the companions group gave their lives for Christ in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, and received beatification during four different occasions between 1900 and 1951. All were canonized during the papacy of Saint John Paul II.
Christianity came to Vietnam through the Portuguese. Jesuits opened the first permanent mission at Da Nang in 1615. They ministered to Japanese Catholics who had been driven from Japan.
Severe persecutions were launched at least three times in the 19th century. During the six decades after 1820, between 100,000 and 300,000 Catholics were killed or subjected to great hardship. Foreign missionaries martyred in the first wave included priests of the Paris Foreign Mission Society, and Spanish Dominican priests and tertiaries.
In 1832, Emperor Minh-Mang banned all foreign missionaries, and tried to make all Vietnamese deny their faith by trampling on a crucifix. Like the priest-holes in Ireland during English persecution, many hiding places were offered in homes of the faithful.
Persecution broke out again in 1847, when the emperor suspected foreign missionaries and Vietnamese Christians of sympathizing with a rebellion led by of one of his sons.
The last of the martyrs were 17 laypersons, one of them a 9-year-old, executed in 1862. That year a treaty with France guaranteed religious freedom to Catholics, but it did not stop all persecution.
By 1954, there were over a million Catholics—about seven percent of the population—in the north. Buddhists represented about 60 percent. Persistent persecution forced some 670,000 Catholics to abandon lands, homes and possessions and flee to the south. In 1964, there were still 833,000 Catholics in the north, but many were in prison. In the south, Catholics were enjoying the first decade of religious freedom in centuries, their numbers swelled by refugees.
During the Vietnamese war, Catholics again suffered in the north, and again moved to the south in great numbers. Now reunited, the entire country is under Communist rule.
*   *   *

My husband and I once lived in "the South" - we are so grateful for those years with such great and dear friends and such good work and Jesus - but it took me a while to figure out even the basics of North and South. I think I got it down, who was the blue, who was the gray, and why every street was named either Stonewall or Jackson or Stonewall Jackson . . . but you are here to witness my latest geographic and historic idiocy (I have a blonde soul, I used to say, and now that I have highlights it's migrating outward): Only in that last sentence above the asterisks did I totally realize there is no longer North and South Vietnam. 

Maybe that's because for me it's about Love. If you could see the sunrise over the mountains out my window you'd understand. And in love, there is always north and south, kind of like there are the wheat and the tares in the Kingdom, or the City of God and the City of Man still mixed up until that last day when the trumpet sounds and Padre Pio can go into Heaven and Therese can finally rest. Oh yeah, and Jesus comes and we get to party forever - or gaze forever, depending on your propensity.

Well, let's pray so we all get there. I have my holy hacks and ways around losing any souls, and I have at least a smidge of Therese's insane confidence because it's true: prayer is SO powerful over His infinitely tender and eternally merciful Heart. Ha! I love it! We pray so He can do what He does and pour mercy over the whole world! What a fun game He's invented!

Time to go to Mass where I'm going to pray for YOU!
May He fill us always with the fullness of His Love, and before that first kiss that lands us smack in the center of the eternal adorable abode called Heaven, let's do our best to keep kissing Him - feet, knees, side, hands, FACE!

St. Andrew and all your companions including Venerable Cardinal Francis Xavier van Thuan and your little Servant of God Marcel Van, pray for us and bring us to Jesus with joy and gratitude! Quickly!


Draw me, we will run!

Happy Feast of all the Carmelite Saints! 

Last week, November 7th was the Feast of All Dominican Saints. At the end of the month, November 29 is the Feast of All Franciscan Saints. On November 1st, we had the Feast of All Saints simpliciter. And today - the feast of all our dear Carmelite Saints!

On this past Saturday, November 11 was the feast of the marvelous St. Martin of Tours (which I just realized this year is an octave away from the feast of St. Martin de Porres on November 3). I was with Carmelite friends and we began a novena to St. Therese for all priests, bishops, and our Holy Father. We wrongly guessed it would end on the Feast of Christ the King, but actually we jumped the gun, imagining Christ the King to be on Sunday November 19, when it's actually on Sunday November 26 in the new calendar this year . . . 

No matter! It turns out our novena is ending on the feast of St. Raphael Kalinowski hidden behind the Sunday....except in Poland his feast is celebrated on November 20, so we can end our novena on his day and his vigil, November 19, and then thank him with festivity on the 20th!

What I LOVE about St. Raphael is his hilarious encounters with St. Therese, our dear patroness, little sister, and mischievous teaser of Marcel (and us too, come to think of it)!

St. Raphael, when he was merely Fr. Raphael of St. Joseph, O.C.D. (no, not obsessive compulsive, but of the Order of Carmelites Discalced!), wrote to the Lisieux Carmel on October 9, 1902, only five years after Therese had flown the coop, leaving this exile for Heaven. She was still simply SIster Therese, no cause or process begun . . . Father's letter is in the "Shower of Roses" included as back matter in the 1911 French edition of Story of a Soul. Forgive me for taking some liberty with the translation of this letter. I'm dependent on my guardian angel for most of my French, and like Padre Pio's angel, not to mention Therese and Marcel themselves, the little imps, my angel likes to tease me. Regardless of my limitations, you'll get the gist.

Fr. Raphael writes: 

October 9, 1902

Reparation

Most Reverend Mother,

The inscription at the head of this letter indicates my duty to make amends for a fault committed by me towards your little saint, Sister Therese of the Child Jesus.

Two or three years ago, when the manuscript was presented to me to do a translation into Polish of the life of this little flower of Carmel, I took the liberty of remarking that the language of our country does not suit her; that it would in no way be in the style of the original, and that reading it would cause nothing but disgust.

It was like putting a brake on the apostolate of this chosen one of God. She must have taken it to heart; and, on the other hand, not only knew how to act in such a way that the proposed translation would be brought to light, but moreover, took it directly from my person.

About eight days ago I returned to my cell, my soul tossed about by the waves of a stormy sea of inner sorrows and not knowing where to find refuge for shelter. . . And now my gaze falls on the French book of the life of the vengeful sister . . . I open it, and I come across the poem "Living on Love." 

Suddenly, the storm subsides, calm returns, something ineffable invades my whole being and transforms me from top to bottom. This hymn was therefore for me the lifeboat: the amiable sister having offered herself as pilot.

So I must note that today the promise, "I want to spend my Heaven doing good on earth . . . After my death I will cause a shower of roses to fall," has truly been realized.

Fr. Raphael of St. Joseph, Discalced Carmelite, Vicar Provincial

And there follows a parenthetical comment that Fr. Raphael Kalinowski died in the odor of sanctity in the year 1907 - on November 15 (tomorrow!), Feast of all Carmelite Souls. The note continues, "His cause for beatification is submitted to Holy Church."

In fact, his cause was formally opened on March 2, 1952, when he gained the title "Servant of God." Pope St. John Paul II beatified Fr. Raphael in 1983 in Kraków, in front of a crowd of over two million people. On November 17, 1991, he was canonized when, in St. Peter's Basilica, Pope St. John Paul II declared his boyhood hero a saint.

I'd say St. Therese got her revenge all right! After Fr. Raphael translated her Story of a Soul into Polish, she got to work polishing up his sanctity, whisking him off to heaven, and eventually making him, on November 17, 1991, when he was declared a saint by Pope St. John Paul II, the first Discalced Carmelite friar to be canonized since his holy father in Carmel, John of the Cross (1542–1591), was named a saint in 1726.

Sounds like this brother and sister duo, Therese and Raphael, plus another Carmelite soul, Pope St. John Paul II, along with St. Martin of Tours on whose feast we began, would love to help us pray for our clergy, that they might be priests after Our Lord's own Heart, priests to please the Blessed Mother in their innocence, simplicity, and holiness, priests led by the guiding star that is St. Therese, the Little Flower, and Brother Marcel Van, the apostle of priests.

Let's do it, then; let's pray! Don't worry that you're joining in late - and don't worry if you forget a day. Failure is the new success and the Little Way is a perfect venue for a little novena:

O Little Therese of the Child Jesus
Please pick for me a rose from the heavenly garden
and send it to me as a message of love.

O Little Flower of Jesus,
please ask God to grant the favors I now place with confidence in your hands . . . that all our priests, bishops, and the Holy Father may become great saints,
and for all the intentions we hold in our hearts.

St. Therese, help me to always believe as you did,
in God’s great love for me,
so that I may imitate your “Little Way” each day.
Amen.

Draw me; we will run!

A personal letter to you from St. Elizabeth of the Trinity:


When you read these lines, your little Praise of Glory will no longer be singing on earth, but will be living in Love's immense furnace; so you can believe her and listen to her as "the voice" of God. Cherished one, I would have liked to tell you all  . . . but the hour is so serious, so solemn . . . and I don't want to delay over telling you things that I think lose something when trying to express them in words. What your child is coming to do is to reveal to you what she feels, or, to be more exact: what her God, in the hours of profound recollection, of unifying contact, makes her understand.

"You are uncommonly loved," loved by that love of preference that the Master had here below for some and which brought them so far. He does not say to you as to Peter: "Do you love Me more than these?" . . . Listen to what He tells you: "Let yourself be loved more than these! That is, without fearing that any obstacle will be a hindrance to it, for I am free to pour out My love on whom I wish! 'Let yourself be loved more than these' is your vocation. It is in being faithful to it that you will make Me happy for you will magnify the power of My love. This love can rebuild what you have destroyed. Let yourself be loved more than these."

Dearly loved one, if you knew with what assurance I understand God's plan for your soul; it appears to me as in an immense light, and I understand also that in Heaven I will fulfill in my turn a priesthood over your soul. It is Love who associates me with His work in you: Oh, how great and adorable it is on God's part! And how simple it is for you, and that is exactly what makes it so luminous! Let yourself be loved more than the others; that explains everything and prevents the soul from being surprised . . .

If you will allow her, your little host will spend her Heaven in the depths of your soul; she will keep you in communion with Love, believing in Love; it will be the sign of her dwelling in you. Oh, in what intimacy we are going to live. Let your life also be spent in the Heavens where I will sing in your name the eternal Sanctus; I will do nothing before the throne of God without you . . . I also ask you not to do anything without me; you have granted me this. I will come to live in you . . . I will instruct you, so that my vision will benefit you, that you may participate in it, and that you too, may live the life of the blessed!

As I leave, I bequeath to you this vocation which was mine in the heart of the Church Militant and which from now on I will unceasingly fulfill in the Church Triumphant: "The Praise of Glory of the Holy Trinity." "Let yourself be loved more than these": it is in that way that your Master wills for you to be a praise of glory! He rejoices to  build up in you by His love and for His glory, and it is He alone who wants to work in you, even though you will have done nothing to attract this grace except that which a creature can do: works of sin and misery . . . He loves you like that. He loves you "more than these," He will do everything in you. He will go to the end: for when a soul is loved by Him to this extent, in this way, loved by an unchanging and creative love, a free love which transforms as it pleases Him, oh, how far this soul will go!

The fidelity that the Master asks of you is to remain in communion with Love, flow into, be rooted in this Love who wants to mark your soul with the seal of His power and His grandeur. You will never be commonplace if you are vigilant in love! But in the hours when you feel only oppression and lassitude, you will please Him even more if you faithfully believe that He is still working, that He is loving you just the same, and even more: because His love is free and that is how He wants to be magnified in you; and you will let yourself be loved "more than these." That I believe is what this means . . . Live in the depths of your soul! My master makes me understand very clearly that He wants to create marvelous things there; you are called to render homage to the simplicity of the Divine Being and to magnify the power of His Love. Believe His "voice" and read these lines He spoke to St. Angela of Foligno as if they are coming directly from Him to you: 

Oh! I love you, I love you more than anyone else in this valley! . . . It is "I" who come, and I bring you unknown joy . . . . I will enter into the depths of your being.

O My Spouse! I have rested and remained in you; now possess yourself and repose in Me! . . . 

Love Me! All your life will please Me, provided that you love Me! . . . I will do great things in you; I will be made known in you, glorified, and praised in you!

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Happy Feast of St. Elizabeth of the Trinity!

How wonderful that our sister Elizabeth, who left the house of Carmel in Dijon for the House of Our Father in Heaven on November 9, 1906, just 9 years after our sister Therese left the Carmel in Lisieux, should have read and loved Story of a Soul in the very scant 8 years between its publication and Elizabeth's departure from exile. Like our sister St. Therese, she beautifully articulates her mission, and like Therese she imagines, anticipates, and fully expects and promises to be very near to us and help us on our own little way to Heaven.

Do stay with us Elizabeth, and help us let ourselves be loved!

For further reading in this 10th anniversary year of the departure from exile of our own beloved Dr. Ronald P. McArthur, a huge fan of both these little Carmelites, click here:

https://catholicexchange.com/books-and-friendship-with-the-saints/

​And meanwhile, don't forget to let yourself be loved!

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Draw me, we will run!