Saint Therese of Lisieux: A Gateway

 As Christmas 1895 approached, Therese, just short of her 23rd birthday, was ending a year of grace.  She had many responsibilities.  Celine was still a novice; their cousin, Marie Guerin, had entered as a postulant on August 15, 1895.  The feast day of the prioress, Mother Agnes (January 21, 1896) was approaching, when Therese would have to hand in her first "copybook of memories" (today the first manuscript of Story of a Soul), and write a play and a poem for that occasion.  So "The Divine Little Beggar of Christmas," a paraliturgy written by Therese in which the whole community participated, is modest compared with her longer plays.  Yet we can learn much from it.

In The Plays of Saint Therese of Lisieux (tr. Susan Conroy and David J. Dwyer; Washington, D.C.: Washington Province of Discalced Carmelites, Inc., 2008), which I recommend to you if you want to understand the importance of Therese's "pious recreations," we learn that this little liturgy replaced the short theatrical piece usually presented at the Christmas recreation, and incorporated the Carmelite custom of drawing "offices at the manger."  It was presented either in the recreation room or in the chapter room, which had a large representation of the Nativity scene.  An angel appeared carrying the child Jesus in its arms and sang to the Carmelites that "the One who is begging from you is the Eternal Word."  The nuns approached the manger in turn; each drew at random a slip of paper from a basket and gave it to the "angel."  It contained a verse about what the Child Jesus was begging from her.  The 26 verses set forth a program of Carmelite life.  This blog entry is an invitation to read "The Divine Little Beggar of Christmas;" its full text appears on the Web site of the Archives of the Carmel of Lisieux.  The introduction and notes which appear only in the print book will greatly enhance the reader's understanding.

This Christmas it seems that our whole world is begging from us, as Jesus is, the gift of ourselves.  May God inspire us to give ourselves fully as Therese did in this year of 1895.