Saint Therese of Lisieux: A Gateway

A tableau of Our Lady nursing Jesus painted by Celine Martin at Therese's request. This image corresponds to verse 4 of "Jesus, My Beloved, Remember!" Displayed at Lisieux in the exposition of 2009. Fervent thanks to Peter and Liane Klostermann for the gift of the photograph and to the Pilgrimage Office at Lisieux for permitting me to display it.

Therese wrote the poem “Jesus, My Beloved, Remember!” for her sister Celine’s feast day in 1895.  Celine was then a novice and had been in Carmel for more than a year.  In June she had made the Offering of herself to Merciful Love with Therese.  In her testimony at the 1910 process, she describes the genesis of this poem:

When I joined the Carmel, I thought that God owed me for the great sacrifice I was making for Him, and, to encourage me in my effort, I begged Thérèse to write me a hymn that would summarise everything that I had left behind for God and end with the word, “Remember”.   She did compose it, but not at all in the way I had hoped, because the soul in the poem reminds Jesus of all that He has done for her. The soul is the one who is indebted and Jesus is the benefactor (PN 24).

From the Archives of the Web site of the Carmel of Lisieux

This poem was not a crude effort to “teach Celine a lesson.”  Instead, it expressed the love and gratitude that were overflowing from Therese’s heart during this year of 1895, when, “casting a glance backward” over her life in order to write her first manuscript, she had a concrete occasion to remember and “to sing the Mercies of the Lord.” 

In “Why I Love You, O Mary” Therese wrote all that she thought about the Blessed Virgin.  “Jesus, My Beloved, Remember” is similarly deep and broad in scope, but this time about Jesus: a song of her tender and intimate love for Jesus.  In 33 verses, Therese pours out the thoughts, not of her mind but of her heart, about the Incarnation, the hidden life of Jesus, and his passion, death, and resurrection.  She does not speak of Jesus in the abstract, but locates Celine, the "sweet echo of my soul," and herself in relationship to his life, his love for them and for the world, and his ministry:

Oh! Jesus, my little Brother, deign to invite me

To that feast of love Your Mother gives you1

[Learn the full story of the portrait of Mary nursing Jesus, painted by Celine at Therese's request but then offered to Leonie].

O Jesus! come within me, come rest your Head,

Come, my soul is truly ready to receive you2 

That I want, O my God,

To carry your Fire far and wide,

Remember3

I invite you to read this poem and meditate on it.  Here Therese, the artist, uses Scripture as the foundation for expressing her intimate relationship with Jesus. She depicts his hidden life, his love for children, the role of his mother in the "way of confidence and love," the apostolate of prayer for priests and for sinners, the "Fire of Heaven" she wants to spread, the Face of Jesus, the love the Crucified poured out on us, and the life of prayer, faith, and waiting for God that is ours since the Resurrection.  

In stanza 12 Therese wrote:

Make me wise in the ways of heaven.

Show me the secrets hidden in the Gospel.4

The poem shows that God answered her prayer.  "Jesus, My Beloved, Remember!" is truly written by a Doctor of the Church.  It is an overlooked jewel which deserves detailed analysis. How does it speak to your heart?

Thanks to the generosity of the Washington Province of Discalced Carmelites and the Web site of the Archives of the Carmel of Lisieux, read the full text of “Jesus, My Beloved, Remember!” online.  The valuable introduction and notes, essential for a full understanding of the poem, appear only in The Poetry of Saint Therese of Lisieux, tr. Donald Kinney, O.C.D.  Washington, D.C.: ICS Publications, 1996.

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Notes:

1.  The Poetry of Saint Therese of Lisieux, tr. Donald Kinney, O.C.D.  Washington, D.C.: ICS Publications, 1996, p. 124.

2.  Ibid., p. 125

3. Ibid., p. 127.

4. Ibid., p. 126.