Holy Mass at the Carmel of Saint Therese of Lisieux (2 June 1980)

On Monday, 2 June 1980, the Holy Father celebrated Mass at the Carmel of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux. In his homily, the Pope spoke on her “little way” of asceticism. 

1. I am very happy to be able to come to Lisieux on the occasion of my visit to the capital of France. I am here on a pilgrimage with all of you, dear Brothers and Sisters, who have also come from many regions of France, to the one we love so much, "little Thérèse" , whose path to holiness is closely linked to Carmel of Lisieux . If people versed in asceticism and mysticism, and those who love the saints, have got into the habit of calling this way of Sister Thérèse of the Child Jesus "the little way", it is quite beyond of doubt that the Spirit of God, who guided her on this path, does it with the same generosity with which he once guided his Patroness the "great Teresa" of Avila, and by which he guided ― and continues to guide ― so many other saints in his Church. Glory therefore be to Him eternally!

The Church rejoices in this marvelous wealth of spiritual gifts , so splendid and varied, as are all the works of God in the visible and invisible universe. Each of them reflects both the interior mystery of man, and it corresponds to the needs of the times in the history of the Church and of humanity. This must be said of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux who, until recently, was indeed our "contemporary" saint.. That's how I see it personally, as part of my life. But is she still the “contemporary” saint? Hasn't it ceased to be so for the generation now coming of age in the Church? You would have to ask the men of this generation. However, allow me to note that the saints practically never age, that they never fall into “prescription” . They continually remain witnesses to the youth of the Church. They never become characters of the past, men and women of “yesterday”. On the contrary: they are always the men and women of the “tomorrow”, the men of the evangelical future of man and of the Church, the witnesses “of the future world”.

2. “For all who are moved by the Spirit of God are sons of God. Also you have not received a spirit of slaves to fall back into fear; you have received a spirit of adopted sons that makes us cry out: Abba! Father! » [ 1 ].

It would perhaps be difficult to find more synthetic, and at the same time more striking, words to characterize the particular charisma of Thérèse Martin, that is to say what constitutes the quite special gift of her heart, and which has become, through his heart, a special gift for the Church . The marvelous gift in its simplicity, universal and at the same time unique. Of Thérèse of Lisieux , we can say with conviction that the Spirit of God allowed her heart to reveal directly, to the men of our time, the fundamental mystery, the reality of the Gospel: the fact of having really received “a spirit of adopted sons which makes us cry out: Abba! Father! ". The “little way” is the way of the “holy childhood”. In this path, there is something unique, a genius of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux . At the same time there is the confirmation and renewal of the most fundamental and universal truth . What truth of the Gospel message is indeed more fundamental and more universal than this: God is our Father and we are his children?

This most universal truth there is, this reality, has also been “re-read” again with the faith, hope and love of Thérèse of Lisieux . It was in some sense rediscovered with the inner experience of his heart and the form taken by his whole life, only twenty-four years of his life. When she died here, in Carmel, a victim of tuberculosis, the bacilli of which she had been carrying for a long time, she was almost a child. She left the memory of the child: of holy childhood. And all his spirituality once again confirmed the truth of these words of the Apostle: you have received a spirit of adopted sons...”. Yes. Therese was the child. She was the child "confident" to the point of heroism, and consequently "free" to the point of heroism . But it is precisely because it was even heroism that she alone knew the inner savor and also the inner value of that confidence which prevents her from "falling back into fear"; of that confidence which, even in the deepest obscurities and sufferings of the soul, makes it possible to exclaim: “Abba! Father! ".

Yes, she experienced that flavor and that price . For those who read his Story of a Soul carefully , it is obvious that this flavor of filial trust comes, like the perfume of roses, from the stem which also bears thorns. If indeed “we are children, we are therefore heirs; heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, since we suffer with Him to be glorified with Him also” [ 2 ]. This is precisely why the filial trust of little Thérèse, Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus but also "of the Holy Face", is so "heroic", because it comes from the fervent communion to the sufferings of Christ .

And when I see before me all these sick and infirm people, I think that they too are associated, like Thérèse of Lisieux , with the passion of Christ, and that, thanks to their faith in the love of God, thanks to their their own love, their spiritual offering mysteriously obtains for the Church, for all the other members of the Mystical Body of Christ, an increase in vigor. May they never forget this beautiful phrase of Saint Thérèse : “In the heart of the Church, my Mother, I will be love”. I pray to God to give each of these suffering friends, whom I love with special affection, comfort and hope.

3. Trusting in God like Therese of Lisieux means following the “little way” where the Spirit of God guides us: he always guides us towards the greatness in which the sons and daughters of divine adoption participate. Already as a child, as a child of twelve, the Son of God declared that his vocation was to be concerned with the things of his Father [ 3 ]. To be a child, to become like a child, means to enter into the very center of the greatest mission to which man has been called by Christ, a mission that goes through the very heart of man. She knew it perfectly, Therese .

This mission draws its origin from the eternal love of the Father. The Son of God as man, in a visible and “historical” way, and the Holy Spirit, in an invisible and “charismatic” way, accomplish it in the history of humanity.

When, at the moment of leaving the world, Christ said to the Apostles: "Go into all the world and teach the Gospel to every creature" [ 4 ], he inserts them, by the force of his paschal mystery, into the great current of the Eternal Mission . From the moment he left them to go to the Father, he at the same time began to come “again in the power of the Holy Spirit” whom the Father sends in his name. More profoundly than all the truths about the Church , this truth was brought into relief in the consciousness of our generation by the Second Vatican Council . Thanks to this, we have all understood much better than the Church is constantly “in a state of mission”, which is meant by the fact that the whole Church is missionary. And we have also better understood this particular mystery of the heart of little Thérèse of Lisieux , who, through her “little way”, was called to participate so fully and so fruitfully in the highest mission. It was precisely this "littleness" that she loved so much, the littleness of the child, which opened up to her the full grandeur of the divine mission of salvation, which is the unceasing mission of the Church.

Here, in her Carmel, in the enclosure of the convent of Lisieux, Thérèse felt especially united to all the missions and to the missionaries of the Church throughout the world. She felt herself a “missionary” , present by the particular strength and grace of the Spirit of love at all the missionary posts, close to all the missionaries, men and women, in the world. She was proclaimed by the Church the patroness of the missions, like Saint Francis Xavier, who traveled tirelessly in the Far East: yes, she, little Thérèse of Lisieux , enclosed in the Carmelite enclosure, apparently detached from the world.

I am happy to be able to come here shortly after my visit to the African continent , and, faced with this admirable "missionary", to render to the Father of eternal truth and love all that, in the power of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, is already the fruit of the missionary work of the Church among the men and peoples of the black continent. At the same time, if I can put it that way, I would like to be lent by Thérèse of Lisieux, the perspicacious gaze of her faith, her simplicity and her confidence, in a word the youthful "littleness" of her heart, to proclaim before the whole Church how abundant the harvest is, and to ask like her, to ask the Master to the harvest to send, with still greater generosity, laborers into his harvest [ 5 ]. May He send them despite all the obstacles and all the difficulties He encounters in the heart of man, in the history of man.

In Africa, I have often thought: what faith, what spiritual energy had these missionaries of the last century or the first half of this century, and all these missionary institutes which were founded, to leave without hesitation for these countries then unknown, for the sole purpose of making the Gospel known, of giving birth to the Church! They rightly saw in it a work indispensable to salvation. Without their audacity, without their holiness, the local Churches whose centenary we have just celebrated, and which are now guided above all by African bishops, would never have existed. Dear Brothers and Sisters, let us not lose this momentum!

In fact, I know you don't want to deal with it. I greet among you the former missionary bishops, witnesses of the zeal of which I spoke. France still has many missionaries throughout the world, priests, men and women religious and lay people, and certain Institutes have opened up to the mission.

I see here the members of the Paris Foreign Missions Chapter, and I am evoking Blessed Théophane Vénard, whose martyrdom in the Far East was a light and a call for Thérèse. I am also thinking of all the French priests who devote at least a few years to the service of the young Churches, within the framework of Fidei donum . Today, moreover, we better understand the need for a fraternal exchange between the young and the old Churches, to the benefit of both. I know, for example, that the Pontifical Mission Societies, in conjunction with the Episcopal Commission for Missions Abroad, are not only aimed at encouraging material mutual aid, but at forming the missionary spirit of Christians in France, and I am delighted about this. This missionary impulse can only arise and bear fruit from a greater spiritual vitality, from the radiance of holiness.

4. "Beauty exists so that it delights us for work", wrote Cyprian Norwid , one of the greatest poets and thinkers that the Polish land has given, and who received ― and kept in the cemetery of Montmorency ― the French land...

Let us give thanks to the Father, to the Son and to the Holy Spirit for the saints. Let us give thanks for Saint Thérèse of Lisieux . Let us give thanks for the profound beauty, simple and pure, which manifested itself in her to the Church and to the world. This beauty enchants. And Thérèse of Lisieux has a particular gift for enchanting with the beauty of her soul. Although we all know that this beauty was difficult and that she grew up in suffering, she never ceases to delight the eyes of our souls with her special charm.

She enchants, therefore, this beauty, this flower of holiness which has grown on this soil; and its charm never ceases to stimulate our hearts to work: "Beauty exists so that it enchants us for work". For the most important work , in which man thoroughly learns the mystery of his humanity. He discovers within himself what it means to have received “the spirit of an adopted son”, radically different from “the spirit of a slave”, and he begins to cry out with all his being: “Abba! Father! » [ 6 ].

Through the fruits of this magnificent interior work, the Church is built , the Kingdom of God on earth, in its deepest and most fundamental substance. And the cry "Abba!" Father! », which resonates widely in all the continents of our planet, also returns by its echo in the silent Carmelite enclosure, in Lisieux, invigorating always anew the memory of little Thérèse , who, by her brief and hidden life but so rich, pronounced with particular force: “Abba! Father! ". Thanks to her, the whole Church has rediscovered all the simplicity and all the freshness of this cry, which has its origin and source in the heart of Christ himself.

[ 1 ] Rom . 8, 14-15.

[ 2 ] Rom . 8, 17.

[ 3 ] Cfr. Luke . 2, 49.

[ 4 ] Mark . 16, 15.

[ 5 ] Cfr. Matt . 9, 37-38.

[ 6 ] Rom . 8, 15.

© Copyright 1980 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana

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