There is a story from the Early Church Fathers that relates how a monk was slapped on the cheek by a young girl possessed by a demon. The monk in turn simply turned his other cheek in obedience to the Lord’s command. The demon could not take it and immediately left the girl. Those who witnessed what happened said, “The pride of demons must fall before humble obedience to the commandments of Jesus Christ.” (Manual for Spiritual Warfare, 181)
This simple witness of humble obedience to God is one of the hallmarks of the great Little Flower, Saint Thérèse of Lisieux. She teaches us that sometimes all it takes to conquer the devil and attain perfection is simply being the person God desires us to be. We need not be heroic, nor a martyr who dies in the arena; instead, we must do God’s will and be His weak instrument.
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“And so it is in the world of souls, Jesus’ garden. He willed to created great souls comparable to Lilies and roses, but He has created smaller ones and these must be content to be daisies or violets destined to give joy to God’s glances when He looks down at His feet. Perfection consists in doing His will, in being what He wills us to be.” – Saint Thérèse of Lisieux[1]
This quote from Saint Thérèse of Lisieux’s autobiography, Story of a Soul, gives great comfort to struggling souls. When we look at the lives of so many saints, like Saint Maximilian Kolbe or Saint Ignatius of Antioch, we see such heroism that it is easy to be discouraged. Most of us will never suffer martyrdom, which usually strikes fear within our hearts. Yet, the “little flower” teaches us a different way, the “little way” of perfection which “consists in doing His will, in being what He wills us to be.” The “little way” is one in which some are called to be great “Lilies and roses” while others are called to be simple “daisies or violets.” Saint Thérèse shows that sanctity is possible to achieve as long as we follow God’s will and simply be what “He wills us to be.” In this post the “little way” of Saint Thérèse will be examined and encouragement will be offered to the soul who thinks he cannot attain sanctity. In the end, Saint Thérèse will demonstrate to the pilgrim soul, that it does not take heroic deeds to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but that perfection lies in being simple and trusting in God’s mercy.
The Beauty of a Garden
First, some are called to be great saints, while others are called to be simple. Saint Thérèse compares the variety of souls in the world to flowers in a garden. She relates how the different flowers within a garden all contribute to its beauty. Also, she states that, “if all flowers wanted to be roses, nature would lose her springtime beauty, and the fields would no longer be decked out with the little wild flowers.”[2] Consequently, God desires to see great beauty when He looks down upon earth—the beauty found in a variety of souls. This is consoling, for it means that God does not require all souls to be identical. Rather, God is generous to both the great saints and the little souls, to whom He “lower[s] Himself” and shows His “infinite grandeur.”[3] He is like a gardener who cares for each flower and is “occupied…with each soul as though there were no others like it.”[4]
Saint Thérèse further expands upon this idea when she is struggling over what God is calling her to be. Saint Thérèse relates how she felt the “vocation of the WARRIOR, THE PRIEST, THE APOSTLE, THE DOCTOR, THE MARTYR.”[5] Yet, while she felt all these desires, that was not what God wanted from her. Instead, God wished her to be perfect in “doing His will.” What that consisted of was not the grand heroic deeds of the great martyrs and doctors of the Church. What God truly wanted from this “little flower” was to be “LOVE.”[6] She understood that “LOVE COMPRISED ALL VOCATIONS, THAT LOVE WAS EVERYTHING. THAT IT EMBRACED ALL TIMES AND PLACES…IN A WORD, THAT IT WAS ETERNAL!”[7] At last Saint Thérèse discovered her vocation and so she “found [her] place in the Church.”[8] This is a great consolation as it shows that all are not called to be warriors or martyrs. Instead, we must all discover what God is calling us to be, which could be something simple, like the vocation of a husband or a teacher. What matters is not the apparent “greatness” of the vocation, but that we accomplish what God asks of us. For Thérèse, God had asked her to be “love” in the “heart of the Church” and she fulfilled that vocation from the solitude of a little monastery in France.[9]
Weak Instruments
Lastly, it is important to know that in the “little way” Saint Thérèse is honest about her weaknesses, which gives strength to the soul who thinks he cannot become a saint. Saint Thérèse recounts that she is “far from being a saint,” because often she will be found sleeping “during [her] hours of prayer and [her] thanksgivings after Holy Communion.”[10] Yet, even amidst her weaknesses, she is able to surrender herself to God and present to Him those very shortcomings. In doing so, Saint Thérèse recognizes that true sanctity does not involve being free from every fault, but humbly admitting that we are “too little to perform great actions” and abandoning ourselves to the Infinite Mercy of God, becoming a “little Victim worthy of [His] LOVE!”[11] Thereby, instead of attaining Heaven by our own strength, like St. Thérèse, we beg our Father, “the Adorable Eagle [to] come fetch me, Your little bird, and ascending with it to the Furnace of Love, You will plunge it for all eternity into the burning Abyss of this Love to which it has offered itself as victim.”[12]
A “Little Way” For All
To conclude, Saint Thérèse of Lisieux’s “little way” is a path to perfection attainable by all. Instead of relying upon our own strength to attain Heaven, we allow God to work within our souls. In place of a desire to be a great saint and being disappointed, Saint Therese teaches the pilgrim soul to simply be “what He wills us to be.” In addition, the pilgrim soul should realize that to accomplish the will of God, it means discovering our place in His garden, being content to be a daisy or violet at the feet of the Gardener. In the end, the “little way” offers great consolation to the pilgrim soul suffering in this place of exile and is a sure path to sanctity for anyone who wishes to be immersed into the unfathomable abyss of God’s infinite love.