Published on September 18 2024

The October issue of Thérèse de Lisieux magazine is available! Find the rector's editorial and subscribe.

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If Saint Therese, very early in her life, was interiorly drawn to meditation — “I went behind my bed into an empty space that was there and it was easy for me to close it with the curtain and there ‘I thought’” (Ms A 33v) — very early also after her entry into Carmel, her prayer was poor, like a wall of silence. As early as January 6, 1889, she wrote to Sister Agnes: “Nothing near Jesus, dryness!… Sleep!…” (LT 74). In this, what Therese experienced resembles what many Christians experience when they try silent prayer. 

But she does not doubt the promises of God and Jesus. She believes with all her soul the word of the Lord: "your Father sees in secret" (Mt 6:6); and also "I am with you always, to the end of the age" (Mt 28,20:XNUMX). Since Jesus is present when she prays, why does he remain silent? This is the question she asks herself. Not "is he there?", but "what is he doing?"

Thérèse's answer is disarming: Jesus is sleeping! She will explain one day to Céline: "He is so tired! ... His divine feet have grown weary of pursuing sinners" (LT 144). So, concerning her prayer, she interprets Jesus' silence as a testimony of familiarity: "Since Jesus wants to sleep, why should I prevent him? I am so happy that he does not bother with me, he shows me that I am not a stranger by treating me like this, because I assure you that he does not spend any money to keep me in conversation!..." (LT 74).

May this issue of the Sanctuary magazine help us to persevere in prayer!

Father Emmanuel Schwab, Rector of the Sanctuary

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