Do small things with great love.

Saint Therese of Lisieux’s holiness is based on doing “little things with great love.” It is difficult to see the life of Therese Martin as common because she is now known as Saint Therese of the Child Jesus and of the Holy Face, Doctor of the Church. A young cloistered nun who lived in the late 1800's, she entered a Carmelite monastery at the young age of 15. Therese wrote the Story of a Soul while in the convent, an autobiography suggested by her mother superior. It has been translated into more than 50 languages. When she was canonized at Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome, more than 500,000 people were present. Therese is now the Patroness of Universal Missions, one of three women Doctor’s of the Church, and Patroness of France together with Saint Joan of Arc.

She is known for her doctrine of the “little way” to reach the heights of holiness, doing small things with great love for God and others. Love was her key to sanctity. She saw herself as weak and little. Unable to climb the rough stairway of perfection, consisting of heroic deeds and great mortifications, she wanted a quick route, or an elevator to take her to Heaven. This elevator, she said, would be the tender arms of Jesus.