SUPER RARE: St.Thérèse of Lisieux, “The Little Flower,” and the sisters at the cloistered Carmelite community of Lisieux, Normandy.
“In May 1887, Thérèse approached her 63-year-old father Louis, who was recovering from a small stroke, while he sat in the garden one Sunday afternoon and told him that she wanted to celebrate the anniversary of ‘her conversion’ by entering Carmel before Christmas. Louis and Thérèse both broke down and cried, but Louis got up, gently picked a little white flower, root intact, and gave it to her, explaining the care with which God brought it into being and preserved it until that day. Thérèse later wrote: ‘While I listened I believed I was hearing my own story.’ To Therese, the flower seemed a symbol of herself, ‘destined to live in another soil.'” [Thérèse of Lisieux: a biography by Patricia O’Connor | Wikipedia]
Photograph from Pontifical University of the Holy Cross via Massimilano Migliorato for CPP
Read this great story about her ‘Christmas Miracle’ HERE