Saints celebrated on the 12th of July
Prayer to the Angels and the Saints
Heavenly Father, in praising Your Angels and Saints we praise Your glory, for by honouring them we honour You, their Creator. Their splendour shows us Your greatness, which infinitely surpasses that of all creation.
In Your loving providence, You saw fit to send Your Angels to watch over us. Grant that we may always be under their protection and one day enjoy their company in heaven.
Heavenly Father, You are glorified in Your Saints, for their glory is the crowning of Your gifts. You provide an example for us by their lives on earth, You give us their friendship by our communion with them, You grant us strength and protection through their prayer for the Church, and You spur us on to victory over evil and the prize of eternal glory by this great company of witnesses.
Grant that we who aspire to take part in their joy may be filled with the Spirit that blessed their lives, so that, after sharing their faith on earth, we may also experience their peace in heaven. Amen.
SS. LOUIS AND ZELIE MARTIN
GREAT CHRISTIAN PARENTS THROUGH FAITH AND EXAMPLE
Louis Martin and Zelie Guerin were themselves the children of two fervent Christian families in the proud land of Normandy in the north of France; formed by the good example all around them and well instructed in the faith. The childhood of Louis was happy and serene, but Zelie had more than her share of suffering. Her health was poor, and her mother was over-severe. ‘Although she was good,’ Zelie wrote years later to her daughter Pauline, ‘she did not know how to handle me, and so I suffered much in my heart.’
DESIRE FOR THE RELIGIOUS LIFE
To both, in their youth, came the desire to consecrate themselves to God in the religious life. Louis, of a contemplative disposition, knocked at the door of the famous monastery of the Great St Bernard in the Alps. Zelie, given to the active life, applied to the Sisters of Charity of St Vincent de Paul. Both applications were turned down by the respective superiors; Louis’s, because of his lack of Latin, and Zelie’s, without any specific reason being given. Obviously, the designs of God were otherwise.
The divine gardener was pruning the tree that would produce rich fruit. Like so many of their time and class in France, they then turned to craftsmanship; Louis became a watchmaker, and Zelie a certified maker of Alencon lace, one of the famous laces of Europe – two crafts requiring intelligence, patience, good taste and a fine touch with the fingers. Both had their workshops in Alencon, and here, mainly through the instrumentality of his mother, the two were first brought together. Kindred spirits in their love of God and religious fervour, the complementarity of their characters soon drew them to esteem and love each other. They were married on July 13, 1858, three months after their first meeting.
OBSERVANCE OF A VOLUNTARY VIRGINITY
To appreciate what follows we must return in spirit to the days of the early Christians when virginity was honoured and loved as a queen for the sake of the Kingdom of God. Louis and Zelie Martin began their married life with the decision to live together after the example of Our Lady and St Joseph in the observance of a voluntarily accepted virginity. For ten months they continued this mode of life until the advice of a prudent Confessor induced them to modify their views. The decisive actor in the change was the desire to give sons and daughters to the Lord. The blessed experience and graces of these first months had enabled them to realise that their true vocation was to sanctify themselves in and through matrimony and parenthood.
Zelie especially felt in her heart that she was born to be a mother. ‘For me they (the children) were our greatest reward,’ she wrote years later to Pauline, ‘and I longed to have a large number to educate them for heaven.’ What a noble ambition for a young wife and how generously God responded to her desires!
Nine children were born to the family – seven girls and two boys; the boys along with two girls died in infancy. The five surviving girls entered religion and lived to a great age except the youngest who died when only 24 years and nine months old. This was Therese [St Therese of the Child Jesus], the one who was to blaze the name of the family in the annals of the Church.
IN EASY CIRCUMSTANCES
Economically, the family, although not rich, was in easy circumstances. Along with their great spiritual and religious qualities, the parents possessed also the best natural qualities of French artisans. They were hard-working, thrifty, scrupulously honest, content with nothing less than work well done. The watch repair business of Louis flourished and the lace-making of Zelie even more. So much so, in fact, that, after some years Louis sold his shop to his nephew and joined his wife and relieved her of a great part of the burden. A man and woman of sturdy independence, they worked and saved for the family – to educate them and to set them up properly in life. They regarded this simply as their duty and gladly undertook it.
On this good natural foundation, grace built a model Christian home. The spirituality of the family life of the Martins Fr Piat sums up in three principles: ‘The absolute sovereignty of God, faith in His providence and abandonment to His divine Will.’ Here are the words of the eldest daughter, Marie: ‘My father and my mother had a faith so great that seeing them speak together on eternity, we felt ready, although still so young, to consider the things of this world as pure vanity.’
THE SHOP WAS NEVER OPEN ON SUNDAYS
The law of God was in the heart of this household and all the precepts of the Church faithfully observed; in spite of the general practice in Alencon, Louis would never open his shop on Sundays and so lost considerably in his profits. Daily Mass and frequent Communion were normal practice for the parents, and later as they grew up, the children joined them; they preferred the early Mass, ‘The Mass of the workers and the poor.’ Not content with being a member of the parish societies – St Vincent de Paul, Nocturnal Adoration etc. – Louis was also assiduous in recruiting other members, and on his transfer to Lisieux he was instrumental in introducing Nocturnal Adoration into that city. When Comte de Mun – the famous social pioneer in France – came to Alencon, Louis joined him in founding the local Catholic Centre. With all his gentleness and retiring ways, he was without fear or human respect when the defence of the Faith or of Christian practice demanded it.
THEY EXCELLED IN CHARITY
He and his wife excelled in charity and readiness to help those in trouble of any kind, the poor, the sick, etc., and helping those out of work to obtain employment; their children were carefully formed on the same lines.
While Zelie was an indefatigable worker and seldom took recreation, Louis loved long walks in the countryside and the mountains. Later on he became a keen fisherman and frequently presented the fruits of his catch to the Carmel of his daughters. He was an excellent swimmer also and on several occasions he had saved people in danger of drowning.
It is scarcely necessary to add that they devoted themselves without reserve to their numerous family. At home they had their own family liturgy and spiritual reading etc. Gentleness was their method but also firmness when necessary. Obedience was insisted on, and self-discipline and self-denial. The disappointment on the face of such loving parents was chastisement enough for the children and an unforgettable lesson for the future. So the young ones, with all the love they received, were never spoiled but were helped very efficaciously to overcome their faults, weaknesses and undesirable inclinations – for it would be a mistake to think that the children were born perfect.
THE MOTHER WAS ALSO A SAINT
So, through the years, Louis and Zelie drew nearer and nearer to God in a complete forgetfulness of self. To use an expression that is popular today they were ‘for others,’ as we can gather from the following extracts. The maid who was with the family when the mother died, wrote in 1923, in her own last illness: ‘In my most terrible sufferings I invoke my little Therese together with her good and holy mother. Because if the little Therese was a saint, the mother, in my opinion is also a great saint…how she knew how to sacrifice herself! For herself everything was. Always good enough; but for others it was not so.’ And on Louis we have a letter from the Sister who was looking after him in the Hospital Bon Sauveur, to Leonie and Celine, telling them that their father wished them to enjoy their holiday in the country and not to anticipate their return for him. The Sister added: ‘The venerable old man does nothing but preach the greater glory of God: it is truly admirable. Not only does he never complain but he finds that everything done for him is excellent.’
CANCER - KEPT HIDDEN FROM THE FAMILY
Two characteristics dominate the life of the Martin family; and both are unmistakable signs of the special favour of God. The first was joy – a joy firmly founded on the love that united all the members together and never failed. Indeed this is what we should expect from such parents. ‘We lived only for our children: they were all our joy,’ Zelie wrote. The second was the Cross. Illness snatched away four children in infancy. Leonie suffered much from ill health and a temperamental character and this made her a difficult child, but she eventually overcame her defects and became an exemplary Religious of the Visitation. Most serious was the case of the mother. Zelie, in spite of her abundant energy, had been delicate as a child. Some years after her marriage the first symptoms appeared of a fatal disease which she kept hidden as long as she could from her dear ones. The cancer that was eating at her breast made her suffer atrociously, and almost worse was her disappointment that she was unable to nurse the younger ones among her children…God took her to Himself at the age of forty-six, when Therese was only four.
It was then that Louis took the decision to sell the lace-making business and retire to Lisieux near the family of his wife’s brother – the Guerins. He had saved up sufficiently to live on his income.
HE BECAME ILL
For 10 years, the father was the head and heart of the home until serious illness came to him too and his last seven years were a martyrdom and humiliation. Repeated strokes first partially paralysed his brain and finally his whole body. He suffered from loss of memory and hallucinations and was unable to assist at the Religious Profession of his beloved Therese. On one occasion he wandered away from home and was lost for four days. He lived in the Bon Sauveur Hospital for three years but he was able to spend the last two years at home under the gentle care of Leonie and Celine, until his death at the age of seventy-one.
NO MIRACULOUS CURE
During a great part of his illness Louis was conscious of his condition and suffered very much. Whom the Lord loves He leads on the way of the Cross. Therese, whose prayers were destined to bring relief and good health for so many, obtained no miraculous cure for the one she loved most on earth – her father. More important, she received wonderful graces of sanctity. ‘The three years of the martyrdom of Papa,’ she wrote later, ‘were the most lovable and the most faithful of all our lives. I would not change them for all the ecstasies and revelations of the Saints.’ She who wrote these marvellous lines had penetrated the secrets of Divine Love. The sufferings and humiliations of her father had not been in vain.
ROLE MODEL FOR MARRIED COUPLES
It is obvious that Louis and Zelie Martin achieved no greatness as the world understands it. Even as Christians their lives were ordinary and normal. They have no descendants on earth today because the five girls who reached adult age consecrated themselves to God in the religious life. Yet their names remain forever a part of the history of the Church because they were a model of what a Christian married couple and Christian parents should be. They were great because they concentrated on the essential – on the ‘one thing necessary’ – and achieved that to perfection.
MASTERPIECE OF LOVE
Louis and Zelie had prayed to God and longed for a son who would become a Missionary. God did not grant their request – and yet He fulfilled it beyond all their dreams. Their youngest child was destined to become, with the great St Francis Xavier, co-Patron of the Foreign Missions. This was Therese, a ‘Masterpiece of Love’, someone called her. A masterpiece of God’s love, obviously – but also of human love sanctified and made divine by the sacramental grace of matrimony in the hearts of Louis and Zelie Martin.
SAINTS
The last word will be to Madame Guerin, wife of Zelie’s brother, Isidore, and from a letter she wrote to Therese in 1891, three years before her father’ death. ‘Your parents, my little Therese,’ she said, ‘belong to that category of persons who can be called saints and who deserve to be the parents of saints.'”
(By the late Archbishop John Dooley, SSC)
ON THE OCCASION OF THE MEMORIAL OF SS. LOUIS AND ZELIE MARTIN
Let us pray.
Father in Heaven, you have ordered the Sacrament of Marriage and the gift of life as an image of your Divine Life with the Son in the Holy Spirit. We pray that the teaching of the Church on the true meaning of marriage and human sexuality may be proclaimed with ever greater love, courage and hope in our world and be received in deep gratitude. Amen.
We ask for the intercession of all the Saints in Heaven. Our Lady, Mother of Nazareth – pray for us. Saint Joseph – pray for us. Saint Thomas More – pray for us. St Therese of Lisieux – pray for us. Blessed Louis and Zelie Martin – pray for us.
(Confraternity of Catholic Clergy)
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