ST THÉRÈSE OF LISIEUX ONE HUNDRED YEARS ON: IRRITATINGLY IRRELEVANT OR PROFOUNDLY RELEVANT? MICHAEL WHELAN SM [1]
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INTRODUCTION
When we read the writings of and about Thérèse of Lisieux we may be put off by certain things. The language and tone of an intensely pious French family [2] at the end of the nineteenth century does not sit easily with the modern Western mindset, so influenced by, among other things, consumerism, functionalism, rationalism, anthropocentrism and a general diminution of a sense of the transcendent. Thérèse's comments on such things as "the world" [3] , Holy Scripture [4] , the Crusades [5] , bodyliness [6] and asceticism, [7] may also make her seem remote and irrelevant to the late twentieth century pilgrim.
Perhaps it is this sort of thing that prompted the great German theologian, Fr Karl Rahner, to write:
"I find many aspects of this saint's personality and writings irritating or merely boring. And if I were to explain what I find almost repulsive about them so that you could see why, it certainly wouldn't justify the trouble of doing so. There are so many other things worth thinking about in the world, and not needing elaborate explanation." [8]
I have never before had the temerity to disagree with Fr Rahner. This time, however, I do disagree with him. I think with regard to St Thérèse of Lisieux he was quite muddled. A close reading of Thérèse's writings - especially the last conversations - reveals, not the irritatingly irrelevant character Rahner speaks of, but a profoundly relevant woman whose struggles at the farther reaches of human nature give us both wisdom and inspiration.
In this brief presentation - in which I can do little more than point to where a more thorough exploration might go - I am going to speak as a friend of Thérèse the pilgrim rather than as a scholar of her writings. The reflection will be more an expression of intuition and meditation than rational thought and critical research. I have developed these reflections like the reader about whom Rainer Maria Rilke writes: "He does not always remain bent over his pages; he often leans back and closes his eyes over a line he has been reading again, and its meaning spreads through his blood." [9]
Thérèse got into my blood. I have no doubts she is profoundly relevant for us today. But, as we proceed, we would do well to keep in mind the critical disposition she kept in mind when seeking to understand the Mother of Jesus: "I must see her real life, not her imagined life". [10] Thérèse maintained a wonderful earthiness and sure footed realism to the end. As we seek her "real life" let us remember that side to her character as well.
I will develop my thoughts principally around what I will call the hope-despair tension. I will suggest that the hope-despair tension is at least latent in every human life and emerges more or less full blown in the lives of those who explore the farther reaches of their humanity - either by choice or expediency; that hope is never found without despair any more than life is found without death; and that Thérèse's own witness gives us much wisdom and inspiration in regard to this fundamental tension in the human pilgrimage. I will also suggest that it is precisely this sort of wisdom and inspiration that we need at this time in history.
But before we reflect on the hope-despair tension, I would like to reflect briefly on the role of spirit - more precisely, our spirit and the Holy Spirit - in the human pilgrimage as such, particularly as understood within our Catholic tradition.
OUR SPIRIT AND THE HOLY SPIRIT
The great religious traditions of the world are full of stories and myths that point to the subtlety, complexity and sheer pain of the struggle to be the human beings we are most deeply called to be. If the truth be told, it is, for the most part, a struggle that few engage with much passion or honesty. T S Eliot has observed that "our lives are mostly a constant evasion of ourselves, and an evasion of the visible and sensible world." [11]
But to address this temptation to evasion and engage this struggle is, in fact, ultimately the work of spirituality. The scholar of comparative religion, Huston Smith points to this when he writes:
"Religion alive confronts the individual with the most momentous option this world can present. It calls the soul to the highest adventure it can undertake, a proposed journey across the jungles, peaks, and deserts of the human spirit. .... 'Who are the greatest benefactors of the living generation of mankind?' asks Toynbee. 'I should say: Confucius and Lao Tzu, the Buddha, the Prophets of Israel and Judah, Zoroaster, Jesus, Mohammed and Socrates'". [12]
We need spirituality - "religion alive" - like we need love and work and play. Our humanity is diminished to the extent that spirituality is not a living reality for us. A society that ignores this "could quite simply die" as the Nobel Laureate, Patrick White, noted, implying that this was a distinct possibility for Australian society. [13]
The great mystics, like those mentioned by Huston Smith - and we can add Thérèse and indeed many others from our rich Catholic tradition - "are the pioneers of the spiritual world". [14] As such they are in fact the "pioneers" of humanity's highest possibilities. They remind us of what we might be if we dare to go beyond the superficialities of doing and having, beyond the illusions of control our egos fabricate, abandon ourselves to the Mystery and allow ourselves to be taken into the depths of our being, where only Grace can take us, where we encounter Being Itself,.
Spirituality is a process of deepening and unfolding relationships - with God, self, others and the physical world. The primary relationship that is the source and strength of all the others is the Covenant relationship with God. My spirit and the Holy Spirit bear united witness that I am a child of God. That is who I am. And so I call God my dear Father (cf Rom 8:14-17).
To be human is to be in love. Literally. And it is not something we achieve by skill, strategy and effort. As Adrian van Kaam notes: "Spiritual formation cannot be forced, only prepared for. Hence its means cannot be those of conquest, but only of facilitation and preparation." [15]
Thérèse was clearly aware of all this. To be human demanded of her this profound inner journey. And it was a journey made by the grace of God and - in the end - only by the grace of God. [16] It was also a journey that led her into the valley of death and beyond. And that brings us to what I am calling the hope-despair tension.
THE HOPE-DESPAIR TENSION
Repeatedly I hear talk these days about being optimistic rather than pessimistic, positive rather than negative. It is as if people recognize there is something radically wrong and think that if we are positive and optimistic enough, all will be well. Clearly the categories of optimism and pessimism, positive and negative, have their place, they are useful. However, when it comes to the ultimate issues of the human spirit, the issues of being rather than merely doing or having, they are simply too superficial to deal with the essential tension and struggle that occurs there for us all. The ultimate categories in this context are hope and despair.
The Spanish philosopher, Miguel de Unamuno says "hope is the longing of God in us, of the eternal in us, of the divine in us which joins to meet our faith and to raise us above ourselves". [17] Hope is a gift, to receive it we must leave ourselves, be drawn beyond ourselves.
Our culture - largely devoid of spirituality - tends to place the focus of human struggle at the level of ego functionality. According to this mythology, life is a matter of control which comes to us through talent, personal effort, strategies, techniques and perhaps a few lucky breaks. The great world religious traditions - and in particular our own Catholic tradition - tell us that this is a superficial and deforming view of human existence. Just as there is no living without dying, so there is no self-fulfillment without self-transcendence. Doing and having have no reality unless they enable us to move more deeply into Being.
It is precisely at this point that the evasion, about which T S Eliot wrote, comes into play. We simply do not want to let go. We resist that radical shift of the centre of gravity from an ego-centred life to a Mystery-centred life. And this is the original sin - we want to be lords of our own lives, centres of our own universes, little gods. But it cannot be this way. Everything for which the human being most deeply longs - love, compassion, wisdom, hope, faith, courage etc - demand that we go out of ourselves. In this "going out" the ego will experience despair. Only the spirit's experience of a much deeper reality will evoke the lifegiving hope that is a counter to that despair.
And hope possesses us, we do not possess it. Hope can hold us even as we stand amidst the absurd, the irrational and, yes, even despair. It scandalizes the rationalist, the functionalist and the control freak. Hope is the Presence, the Great Promise, "I am with you!", taking hold and rooting us in the Eternal. It does not get rid of the despair, it makes sure the despair does not get rid of us.
Hope calls for surrender and abandonment. It is not, ultimately, just the conviction that all will turn out well in the end. It is, ultimately, a being gripped by love when there is no evidence of love, being blinded by the light when all is dark, being held by God when you have lost all sense of God. Again, Miguel de Unamuno notes the paradoxical intensity of deep hope when he says "it is despair and despair alone which engenders heroic hope". [18]
Thérèse knew this "despair which alone engenders heroic hope". In this she is a post-modern woman. She knows, first hand, a de-constructed world, a world in which all is called into question. One in which a hermeneutics of suspicion has taken charge. She confronts the void, the abyss, the darkness of a world stripped of sensibilities for the Divine. Bernard Bro writes:
"Marx, Nietzsche, Freud: the three giants dominating modern thought. With them the age of roses is over. And in fact the only way of appreciating Thérèse of Lisieux today is by adding her squarely to their company. It is the same battle all along the line: man confronting the abyss. Here lies her genius. Surely, one among women who went the farthest, 'to the end'. When she opted for the good, she knew - and says - what it would have been like if she had opted for rupture, loneliness and evil; and when she pursued her quest for God, she knew that it wasn't primarily a case of seeking him, but of his seeking her: 'He will get tired of making me wait for him long before I get tired of waiting for him'." [19]
Thérèse had an extraordinary gift of being able to identify with other people. [20] I believe, in those last months, she received the grace of identifying with those who had lost their sensibilities for God, people in whom the hope-despair tension was - potentially at least - an all consuming battle, a fight to the death. I believe, further, that this was in fact the essence of what she called the "dark tunnel". [21] That is, she knew what it was like to be an atheist and to feel the full import of that. She writes in June 1897:
"During those very joyful days of the Easter season, Jesus made me feel that there were really souls who have no faith, and who, through the abuse of grace, lost this precious treasure, the source of the only real and pure joys. He permitted my soul to be invaded by the thickest darkness, and that the thought of heaven, up until then so sweet to me, be no longer anything but the cause of struggle and torment." [22]
In the same context she says "everything has disappeared" and "I sing simply what I want to believe". Again, Thérèse was a realist. [23] We must assume she is saying exactly what she means here. I have often wondered what kept her from slipping away into total despair during these horrible trials. I now believe she had given herself over so completely to God, with such childlike simplicity, that she was - to use John Clarke's word - "possessed" by God. [24] This battle was far removed from any mere ego struggle, or willful effort. This was her spirit and the Holy Spirit bearing testimony to the fact that she was the Father's dear child, held firmly in His embrace during her darkest hours. [25]
CONCLUSION
Like those quintessential post-modern characters from Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, [26] Estragon and Vladimir, Thérèse kept her appointment. She was faithful to the end. Thérèse remains profoundly relevant for us, not so much because of what she did, but rather because of what she allowed God to do through her, with her and in her. She reminds us that the essential human struggle is at the deepest levels of our being, beyond the effortful reach of ego functionality. When it comes down to it, we must be judged by how well we engaged life at that level of being. And only God will know that. What we did - and even less what we possessed - only have value to the extent that they manifested and exposed what we are. And at this level we realize that the essential struggles are not waged by us but by God in us. We surrender, we trust, like children in the Presence of a loving Father we abandon ourselves and say "Into your hands I commend my spirit!"
A final, practical word. One of the greatest enemies of the Gospel is moralism. And Christianity down through ages - and perhaps especially today - is rife with moralism. Moralism reduces Jesus to a moral teacher and the Gospel to a moral system. It says that being baptized into Christ means simply behaving in a certain way. Behaviour becomes the focus - do this, don't do that. Thus fidelity becomes legal purity, obedience becomes conformity, faith becomes ideology, preaching becomes propaganda, spirituality becomes cluttered piety, asceticism becomes willful effort and renewal becomes functionalistic problem solving.
The Person and Teaching of Jesus is relationship, Covenant. It is the Good News that through Him, with Him and in Him we are set free from the bondage of sin and death. It is first and last a matter of being. Yes, there is certainly a moral vision there and implications for behaviour, but that is subsequent and relative to our relationship with God in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus goes to the heart of the human struggle and that is where we find Him and all His genuine disciples. This is where the person and writings of Thérèse invite us. You get there by being there. And you can only be there by the grace of God. At this level all our energies are directed at keeping the appointment and enabling God's Spirit and our spirit as much room as possible to bear united witness that we are children of God whom we call "Abba! Father!".
REFERENCES
[1] Talk given at Ormiston Carmel Sunday September 28, 1997. Michael Whelan, SM, Ph.D. is the Director of the Aquinas Academy adult education centre in Sydney.
[2] Thérèse, born January 2, 1873, was the youngest of five girls - four other children died. All five daughters entered religious life: Marie (b. February 22, 1860, became a Carmelite October 15, 1886, d. January 19, 1940; Pauline, b. September 7, 1861, became a Carmelite October 2, 1882, d. July 28, 1951; Léonie, b. June 3, 1863, became a Visitandine January 28, 1899, d. June 16, 1941; Céline, b. April 28, 1869, became a Carmelite September 14, 1894, d. February 25, 1959; Thérèse was four when her mother died of breast cancer. She became a Carmelite April 9, 1888 and died, aged 24, of tuberculosis, on September 30, 1897. It is also worth noting that Thérèse's father suffered a serious breakdown soon after she entered Carmel.
[3] Cf for example: "God gave me the grace of knowing the world just enough to despise it and separate myself from it". Story of a Soul, trans John Clarke, ICS Publications, 1976, p.73.
[4] Cf for example her reference to Sacred Scripture as "dictated by the Holy Spirit". The Yellow Notebook, p.132, August 4, 1897, #5. The Yellow Notebook will be referred to as TYN from here.
[5] Cf for example her recollection of a dream: "With what happiness, for example, during the time of the Crusades, would I have left to fight against the heretics. I would not have been afraid to gt a bullet in me". TYN, p.132, August 4, 1897, #6.
[6] Is Thérèse reflecting Jansenism or something else when she says: "My body has always embarrassed me; I've never been at ease in it … even when very small I was ashamed of it". TYN, p.118, July 30, 1897, #1.
[7] Cf for example: "Ah, in heaven, God will reward us for having worn heavy habits here on earth out of love for him" (TYN, p.133, August 3, 1897, #5); "I don't know if I should tell Father Youf that I had thoughts of gluttony, because I thought of things I like, but I offer them to God" (TYN, p.170, August 26, 1897, #4); "By the day before her first Communion Thérèse had recorded 2,773 invocations, including 'Little Jesus I love you' (50 times), 'Little Jesus don't let me be proud anymore' (30 times) etc." (Patricia O'Connor, In Search of Thérèse, Darton, Longman and Todd, 1987, p.102.)
[8] Cited by Bernard Bro, The Little Way, Christian Classics, 1980, p.1.
[9] Rainer Maria Rilke, trans M D Herter Norton, The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge, W W Norton, 1949, p.201. What I am describing here is of course the way of lectio divina. John Henry Newman's observation is also pertinent: "You must be patient, you must wait for the eye of the soul to be formed in you. Religious truth is reached, not by reasoning, but by an inward perception. Anyone can reason; only disciplined, educated, formed minds can perceive." From a letter to Miss M Holmes, 8th March, 1843. Cited by Ian Ker, John Henry Newman, Oxford University Press, 1988, p.273.
[10] TYN, p.161, August 21, 1897, #3.
[11] T S Eliot, The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism, Barnes and Noble, 1970. Similarly Eliot comments: "Humankind cannot bear very much reality." T S Eliot, Burnt Norton.
[12] Huston Smith, The Religions of Man, Perennial Library, 1965, p.11. And David Tracy observes: "The artist, the thinker, the hero, the saint - who are they, finally, but the finite self-radicalized and intensified." The Analogical Imagination, Crossroad, 1981, p.124.
[13] Patrick White, Latrobe University Address (1987). R D Laing shares White's concern when he speaks of "the unbelievable devastation" we have made of our experience. He argues that we have cut ourselves off from significant possibilities for human growth by delimiting our experience. In particular he writes: "And immediate experience of, in contrast to belief or faith in, a spiritual realm of demons, spirits, Powers, Dominions, Principalities, Seraphim and Cherubim, the Light, is even more remote. As domains of experience become more alien to us, we need greater and greater open-mindedness even to conceive of their existence". Cf The Politics of Experience, Penguin Books, 1967, p.22f and p.50ff. The American novelists, Saul Bellow and Walker Percy are worth reading in this regard also. They reflect the concern that we have in fact developed a culture in the West that is soulless, that tries to live without spirituality and does not realise that is impossible.
[14] Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism, A Meridian Book, 1955, p.4.
[15] Adrian van Kaam, Studies in Formative Spirituality, I, 2 (1980), p.303
[16] Cf eg TYN, p. 88 - July 11, 1897, #3 and TYN, p.139 - August 6, 1897, #4 & #8. There are many other similar examples. Note also the great confidence Thérèse derives from this "not to become discouraged over one's faults". God's gracious love has the first and last word. Her spirit is reminiscent of Bernard of Clairvaux: "The mercy of the Lord is, then, my merit. I am never bereft of merit so long as he is not bereft of mercy. For if the mercies of the Lord are many, then many are my merits. But what if I am aware of my many sins? Then, where sin increased, grace abounded all the more." (Sermons on the Song of Songs, 61:5). In the spiritual life we tend to end where we begin. If we begin with ourselves and what we must do, that is where we will finish - wilfully striving to achieve what must, in the end, be a gratuitous gift. Thus we despair and in our despair lack the freedom and graciousness that are two of the principal authenticating signs of sound spirituality. If we begin with God and what God has done and seeks to share with us, we will end in the infinite horizons of God's love - willingly being drawn into the Trinitarian Life. Thus we are filled with hope and exhibit quite naturally the freedom and graciousness that are signs that God is having His way.
[17] Miguel de Unamuno, The Tragic Sense of Life in Men and Nations, trans Anthony Kerrigan, Princeton University Press, 1990, p.219.
[18] Op. cit., p.352.
[19] Bernard Bro, op. cit., p.13.
[20] For example, the famous occasion when she, as a 14 year old, prayed for Henri Pranzini.
[21] Story of a Soul, p.212.
[22] Story of a Soul, op. cit., p.211.
[23] Cf for example TYN, p.77, July 7 1897, #4: "… this isn't my little style. Let Doctor de Cornière think what he wants." Again, TYN, p.92, July 13 1897, #7: "I always act without any pretence." See the similar comment on August 11, #6. Perhaps most revealing of all is her rejoinder - on September 2, - when the comment was made by her much loved older sister, Pauline, "Surely you will die on a feast day": "It will be a beautiful enough feast day in itself! I have never had any desire to die on a feast day".
[24] See Introduction to Story of a Soul, p.23.
[25] Francois Mauriac has drawn a parallel between Thérèse and another French woman, Marie Noël (cf Introduction to Notes for Myself, trans. Howard Sutton, Cornell University Press, 1968, p.xii.) For example, Marie Noël writes: "During those frightful years I remained alone, face to face with myself, with no one in whom to confide. Who, for that matter, can ever penetrate - friend or priest - to the secret place where doubt, that dark form of adoration, approaches the Infinite with trembling?" (p.6); "He who struggles in obscurity, patiently, humbly, silently, for the godliness of his own soul saves the world" (p.25); "Lord, I do not love You, I do not even want to. I am weary of You. I am not even sure that I believe in You. But look on me in passing by. Take shelter for a moment in my soul, set it in order with your breath, discreetly, silently. If You want me to believe in You, bring me faith. If You want me to love You, bring me love. I have none, and there is no help for it. I give You what I have: my weakness, my pain. And the need for affection which torments me and which You know. … And despair. … And wild shame … My hurt, only my hurt. … Nothing more! And hope!"(p.29).
[26] Although Beckett was an Irishman, he spent most of his adult life in France and wrote most of his plays in French, which he then translated into English. Waiting for Godot first appeared in Paris as En Attendant Godot in 1953 two year after Thérèse's beloved older sister Pauline died and seven years before the death of another older sister, Céline.
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Dr Michael Whelan sm is former principal of The Catholic Theological Union (Sydney) and current director of The Aquinas Academy.
