The Little Flower And The Blessed Sacrament

Front matter

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“King, whom I love the most, The star I always see

Contents

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I. Early Eucharistic Attractions.......... all

II. The Divine Prisoner of Love.......... 25

Chapter I Early Eucharistic Attractions

OVE of the Holy Eucharist was early instilled into the soul of the little Teresa. Like a quickening dew it slipped into the heart of the “Little Flower,” long before its tiny petals had unfolded in all their beauty. From the age of two, she tells us, she was already drawn to the Divine Spouse of virgins.

At what time she first came to know and love Him in His Blessed Sacrament we are not informed by her. The words she puts upon the lips of her sister Celine, in that delightful poem, “What I Used to Love,” may well lead us to conclude she was there in reality deseribing her own experience no less than that of her playmate and praymate in that springtime of her childhood. In simple language she thus records these earliest intimacies of virginal affection for Christ in the Holy Eucharist:

“O, how I loved my heavenly Lord, In His blest Sacrament adored! He bound me to Him by His plighted word: That He my Spouse would be From infancy.”

She was not yet four years of age when the following conversation between herself and Celine was overheard by their mother:

“How ean God be in such a tiny Host?” asked Celine.

“That is not strange,’”’ replied little Teresa, “because God is Almighty.”

“And what does ‘Almighty’ mean ?”

“Tt means that He can do whatever He lhkes.”

Happy little children, brought so early to the knowledge and love of the Supreme Good by the tender care of a wise and loving mother!

The delightful autobiography of St. Teresa of the Child Jesus, written in obedience to the wish of her Mother Prioress, gives us only passing glimpses of this noble woman after God’s own Heart; but they are enough to reveal her to us in all the charm of domestic affection, gentle as she was firm in her control, winning as she was saintly in her life. We find her always with her little ones, saying their prayers with them, accompanying them in their walks, training them with all the skill of personal experience in the art of sanctity, and so finally, lke St. Paul, making them imitators of herself as she also was an imitator of Christ. Thus reared in holiness from their tenderest years, it was only necessary to point out to them the Virgin Christ in His Holy Eucharist that they might love Him with all their hearts.

At the early death of this valiant woman the full responsibility of the home fell upon the “incomparable father” of that family, a man like St. Joseph, hidden and saintly in his life. St. Teresa, referring to his custom of daily reciting the family prayers with his children, wrote: “I had only to look at him to know how the saints pray.”

But he was no less humanly tender than he was heroic in his faith and sacrifice. Constantly he deepened and strengthened in little Teresa the love of her Divine Spouse and of His Presence in the Eucharist. As an instance I may cite her own words in which she describes the rambles she was wont to take with him.

“Bvery afternoon,” she says, “I went out for a walk with him, and we paid a visit to the

Blessed Sacrament in one or other of the churches.” It was in this way that St. Teresa of the Child Jesus first saw the chapel of the Carmel in which she was to spend so many happy hours.

“Look, little Queen,” he observed, using the pet name he had given her, “behind that big grating there are holy nuns who are always praying to Almighty God.” Little did she then think that soon she, too, would be kneeling there with them before the Divine Presence in the Blessed Sacrament.

At about the age of five, while playing among the flowers, of which she was always very fond, she already found her amusement in making little altars within openings that she happened to find in the garden wall. When her tiny structures were completed, she would run to eall her father, who invariably shared in her delight. Incidentally, too, these diversions manifest the attraction which Altar and Tabernacle even then exercised over her, and how the Divine Presence had captivated her thoughts and her heart.

Holiness may be said to have been almost bred in the very nature of this favored child, thanks to the eucharistic devotion of her wise and pious parents, who knew how. to make piety joyous, while play itself was hallowed by piety. Thus the way had been lovingly prepared for that Divine Bridegroom of her soul who at once led her by these sweetly scented paths directly to the great central mystery of our Faith, the Holy Eucharist.

That love of God which the parents so carefully instilled into the soul of little Teresa was no mere sentiment. It was a love strong in action and in suffering.

“T offered myself to Our Lord to be His Little Flower,” she writes. “I longed to console Him, to draw as near as possible to the Tabernacle, to be looked on, eared for, and gathered by Him.”

The desire of complete self-oblation now took possession of her heart. Such, in particular, were the affections aroused in her while looking at a picture whose charming title was: “The Little Flower of the Tabernacle.”

But her supreme happiness consisted in taking her place in the procession of the Blessed Sacrament, there to await the moment when she could toss her flowers to the Divine King

‘“Never was I so happy as when I saw my rose-leaves touch the sacred Monstrance.’?

as He was borne along in triumph. She was not content merely to scatter them in His path—her love was far too intimate for that !— but she must even then signalize herself in her own daring way. And evidently no one thwarted these acts of childish affection which so delighted the Heart of her virginal Spouse. She herself tells us:

“Above all, I loved the procession of the Blessed Sacrament: what a joy it was to strew flowers in God’s path! But before scattering them on the ground I threw them high in the air, and was never so happy as when I saw my rose-leaves touch the sacred Monstrance.”

Every Sunday was a day of joy to her, when, as she tells us, “the whole family went to High Mass.’’ Here she could satisfy her longing to be in the presence of Christ, to pour out her little heart before Him, and to listen to His own voice speaking to her from the silent Tabernacle.

Of the Little Flower’s ardent desire for Holy Communion, almost from the days of babyhood, much remains to be said elsewhere in this volume, and also of her other eucharistic attractions, so remarkable in one of her tender years.

Laer

These were the first sparks of that great eucharistic love which was to inflame her soul. .

Little Teresa, it may be a consolation for some souls to know, was not “popular” at school. Nor did she find it possible even later to enter into long, familiar conversations with her teachers, as others of the older pupils did, or to win any special tokens of favor from them, though she led in her studies. That was God’s particular blessing in her regard. It drew her nearer to Him. It made her realize, with her vast capacity and desire for love, that He alone was her true and lasting Friend. If at times it produced within her a natural depression of spirit, it nevertheless taught her in consequence to appreciate more highly the consoling Presence of Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist. His love alone could never fail her. Others might forget or overlook her; He would always have His Heart wide open for her. To us, too, let us remember, that love is extended, and to all who wish to come to Him.

Referring to a period in her life when twice a week she went to take lessons in a convent, just for the sake of being admitted into the Sodality of the Blessed Virgin, she writes:

“So I worked in silence till the end of the lesson, and then, as no one took any notice of me, | went to the tribune in the chapel till Papa came to fetch me home. Here, during this silent visit, I found my one consolation; for was not Jesus my only Friend? To Him alone could I open my heart.”

What graces must have been granted to her by her Divine Spouse in these trysts of love! She applied to herself in their fullest sense those words of Our Lord: “If you ask the Father anything in My name, He will give it you.” Nor was she ever disappointed, for she sought always to bring her will into complete conformity with His. Truly, therefore, could she sing:

“All things my love can gain when, heart to heart, I pray, Alone with Jesus Christ in speechless eestasy. Beside His altar blest with Him I gladly stay: O, this is heaven for me!”

It was here that in later years she was to pray so earnestly for our Holy Mother the Church; for those entrusted to her care; for friends, relatives, and her own Sisters in

Religion; for every soul, that God might enter in and establish there His reign of love, but especially for priests, that they might truly be “other Christs.” Here, too, could she plead, like Moses on the mountain, that God might multiply vocations and send ever greater armies of workers into His vineyard and His harvest field.

But neither was the Chureh Suffering forgotten by her, the souls confined in Purgatory, for whom the Heart in the Tabernacle is moved with such tender affection. She herself tells us how her rose-leaves, made precious by the touch of the Divine Hand, were scattered by It upon those holy sufferers to extinguish their flames.

It is precisely in connection with the Holy Eucharist that so many indulgences can be gained by us for the Poor Souls. The one familiar prayer alone which is to be said after Communion before an image of the Crucified, enables us to gain a Plenary Indulgence each time we receive Our Divine Lord, provided some additional prayers—e. g., five “Our Fathers” and five “Hail Marys” are recited for the intention of the Holy Father.

A loving zeal to aid these souls in God’s prison house, is a devotion which the Heart of Jesus has intimately connected with the Sacred Presence, with Communion and the Holy Massas also of course with the Rosary and the Way of the Cross. Our Lord seems to say: “If you love Me in My Sacrament of: Love, help the souls whom JI love, that you may hasten the day when I can clasp them to My Heart of Love.”

But years passed, and Teresa too, like Our Divine Lord, “advanced in wisdom, and age, and grace with God and men.” But never did she lose the simplicity and sweet charm of her childhood days. If then she delighted to cast her flowers. before the Eucharistic King, and her heart leaped with joy as her petals touched the sacred Monstrance, she now continued each day to scatter her blossoms before God, but hereafter these flowers were to be her sacrifices and prayers, her joys and sufferings of life, all offered up in the trusting spirit of childhood, with the utmost love and self-abandonment.

“But how should I show my love, since love proves itself by deeds?” she asks, and her answer comes: “Well, the little child will strew flowers. She will embalm the Divine Heart with their fragrance. She will sing Love’s canticle in silvery tones.”

Well may we faney her words as joyously reminiscent of those Blessed Sacrament Processions of earlier days, the happy memory of which clung like a perfume to her heart. How redolent with these odors are the thoughts that follow !

“The only way I have of proving my love is to strew flowers before Thee—that is to say, I will let no tiny sacrifice pass, no look, no word. I wish to profit by the smallest actions, and to do them for Love. I wish to suffer for Love’s sake, and for Love’s sake even to rejoice; thus shall I strew my flowers. But not one shall I find without seattering its petals before Thee. And I will sing, I will sing always, even if my roses must be gathered from amidst thorns; and the longer and the sharper the thorns, the sweeter shall be my song.’’

How beautifully eucharistic, then, the entire concept is! How it reminds us of those ranks of little, white-clad children, with innocence beaming upon their bright and happy faces, as they solemnly strew their blossoms in the pathway of the King, as He is borne aloft between them in His golden Monstranece! And how often, too, the Little Flower scattered those petals of her roses before that Altar Throne in the Carmel’s silent chapel, where her soul found its sweetest resting place. “This fragrant shower, these delicate petals of little price, these songs of love from a poor little heart,” she knew were pleasing to Jesus, refreshing to His Heart, like as the rose-leaves strewn by children’s hands.

“Trifles they are, but Thou wilt smile on them. The Chureh Triumphant, stooping towards her child, will gather up. these scattered rose-leayes, and, placing them in Thy Divine Hands, there to acquire an infinite value, wil} shower them on the Church Suffering to extinguish its flames, and on the Church Militam to obtain its victory.”

Such were the results in large part due te that eucharistic devotion practised by her from childhood and constantly intensified with the years, until from the shelter of the Carmel she might melodiously sing:

“My Heaven within the Host safe hid and perfect les, EE Where Jesus Christ abides, Divinest, fairest Fair; From that ereat fount of love shall life eternal rise There night and day my Lord gives heed unto my prayer.”

Parents should learn to stimulate in the hearts of their children, even from their tenderest years, those eucharistic longings and affections which worked so mightily within the soul of little Teresa, and which helped so greatly to keep it always pure, holy and beautiful. Let us not deprive our little ones of their sublimest heritage, the love of Jesus in the Eucharist.

Chapter II The Divine Prisoner Of Love

T WAS Teresa’s clothing day in the Carmel.

Her father had come to meet her at the

enclosure door, his eyes filled with tears of joy. Pressing her to his heart, he exclaimed:

“Ah! here is my little Queen!”

He then gave her his arm, and together they solemnly entered the publie chapel.

His two eldest daughters had already joined the Carmel. Celine too had confided to him her wish to leave the world. His gratitude therefore knew no bounds. Where could he better pour forth the gladness of his heart than in the presence of his Eucharistic King? The ardent desire of his saintly wife, during her brief life, was now receiving its last and complete fulfilment.

“T beseech Thee,” she repeatedly had asked of Almighty God, “to make me the mother of many children, and to grant that all of them may be dedicated to Thee.”

Such, too, had been his own most fervent wish, though he never sought to forestall the workings of the Holy Ghost in the souls confided to him.

“Let us go before the Blessed Sacrament,” he now said, “and thank God for all the graces He has granted us and the honor He has paid me in choosing His spouses from my household. God has indeed done me great honor in asking for my children. If I possessed anything better, I would hasten to offer it to Him.”

More than ever the Little Flower was henceforth to bloom and spend herself for her Beloved, and draw, in ever greater measure, from the Divine Sun of Love the sweetness and beauty which were so to entrance the world in after years and turn men’s hearts to God in new and fuller dedication. Many, indeed, were the lessons she was to learn during the moments of sublime intimacy that were to pass between herself and that hidden Bridegroom of her soul, speaking to her from behind the lattice, in the silence of the Tabernacle.

In her masque, “The Angels of the Crib,” she makes the Angel of the Eucharist fly to earth to seek Christ’s Altar Throne. She herself might now sing with this celestial Guardian of her Eucharistic God:

“Here shall I dwell in this blest place, The sanctuary of my King,

And here before His veiled face My hymns of burning love shall sing.”

In the Holy Eucharist she beheld the completion of Christ’s profound self-abasement : the Divine King of Glory submitting Himself in wondrous humility to all His priests. They may have less or greater fervor, they may advance or delay the hour of the Holy Saerifice, yet He is always ready to come down from His high Heaven at their call. The Faithful, too, may heed His invitation. They may hasten to Him with the utmost frequency and affection, or they may delay to follow His invitation and approach Him only with coldness and indifference. Yet He gives Himself to all alike.

“OQ my Beloved,” she exclaimed, in a prayer composed by her for a novice, “under the white eucharistic veil Thou dost indeed appear to me meek and humble of heart! To teach me humility Thou canst not further abase Thyself, and so I wish to respond to Thy love by putting

Teresa escapes from home and goes to church in pouring rain.

myself in the lowest place, by sharing Thy humiliations, so that I may ‘have part with Thee’ in the Kingdom of Heaven.”

Before the Blessed Sacrament, too, she learned to know the greatness of that love for us which burns within the Eucharistic Heart of Christ. How could she be deaf to the appealing ery of that Prisoner of Love?’ Keenly and ever more perfectly she came to understand His insatiable thirst for our poor human love which every hour would seem, as it were, to consume

Him:

“Thou, the great God whom Heaven and earth adore, Art here, a prisoner for me, night and day, And every hour I hear Thy voice implore: ‘I thirst!’ ‘I thirst!’ ‘I thirst!’—for love alway.”

What answer could she give to this ery other than the complete oblation of herself to live for Him alone and be in turn the victim of His Divine and infinitely tender love for her? What other answer can any of us give to that yearning love of Christ? With heart aflame she thus, therefore, makes her reply of love for love:

“Behold, Thy prisoner am 1; I, too, ery ever unto Thee Thine own Divine and tender ery: ‘I thirst! O let me die Of love for Thee!’ ”

It was not her own delight, however, which she sought in this love, but the dehight of her Divine Spouse. The reason for our discouragement is frequently the fact that we seek inordinately after our own consolation rather than leave ourselves entirely to the Divine Lover of our souls, seeking only to afford Him pleasure and delight. Suffermg for His sake became her greatest earthly joy. “One cannot attain the end without adopting the means,” was her simple philosophy, “and as Our Lord made me understand that it was by the Cross He would give me souls, the more crosses I met with, the more strong grew my attraction to suffering.” This affection, however, she kept hidden within her soul as the secret of the King. Yet she could not help expressing it in her transports of song. The Cross and the Eucharist she mentions together as her two greatest treasures upon earth, her happiness and her riches. Charmingly she compares them with the exalted privileges possessed by her Guardian Angel and feels no inclination to envy him his own excessive joy and splendor:

“Thine are Heaven’s glory and delight, The riches of the King of kings; The Host in our ciboriums bright is mine, and ali the wealth pain brings. So with the Cross, and with the Host, And with thine aid, dear Angel Friend, I wait in peace on time’s dark coast Heaven’s happiness that knows no end.”

What more indeed can we desire here below, with Mary for our Mother, whom the Little Flower loved so tenderly, and our Angel Guardian ever by our side, and Heaven’s Lord and God as all our own, cur Prisoner of Love, our daily food? We too ean offer Him not only our love in return, but likewise our little sufferings and sacrifices and voluntary self-denials, all brought to Him and laid upon His breast as a bundle of sweet-scented myrrh.

No wonder then that in spite of her longing to be dissolved and be with Christ in His eternal home, the Little Flower of Jesus would not ask of her Divine Lover that the period of her earthly exile might in the least be shortened. She had instead but one desire, that His holy will might be most perfectly done:

“Beyond the gloomy cloud Ever the skies are fair, And angels sing aloud, And God is reigning there; And yet without a tear I wait that bliss above, Who in the Host have here The perfect fruit of love.”

We must not, however, imagine that this attraction, which so strongly drew her to the Sacramental Presence of her Lord, the eucharistie court where the Divine King is ever prepared to grant us audience and admit our souls to the virginal intimacies of His Love, could ever withhold her from the performance of even the least of her lowly duties. The thought of seeking Him in preference to these never entered her mind. To be ready to leave God for the sake of God, as we may express it, is the test of true love. Our hearts can then still remain with Him in an uninterrupted communion of that perfect love which consists in doing His holy will expressed for us in the daily duties of our life.

Another test of the strength of that love which we protest before the Blessed Sacrament is the patience and humility which we practise in our common intercourse with men, and our willingness to yield to others in all things, where this can be prudently and justly done. A little incident from the life of St. Teresa will illustrate these eucharistic virtues.

Teresa had been sent to work in the laundry. As it happened, the Sister opposite her, in washing handkerchiefs, repeatedly splashed her with the dirty water. “My first impulse,” she writes, “was to draw back and wipe my face, to show the offender I should be glad if she would behave more quietly; but the next moment I thought how foolish it was to refuse the treasures God offered me so generously, and I refrained from betraying my annoyance.”

The action of the Sister had been due to mere thoughtlessness, and her attention might have been called to it without any act of

[ 33] gt. ALBERT’S COLLEGE LIBRARY uncharitableness. Yet Teresa’s finer sense overcame her repugnance, and at the end of half an hour she had taken quite a fancy to this ‘novel kind of aspersion.” She even resolved to come often to “the happy spot where such treasures were freely bestowed.”

This is the folly of Christ’s little ones which the worldly-minded cannot understand. It is the folly, too, of the Divine Prisoner of the Tabernacle who is constantly enduring with loving patience such petty annoyances, even from the souls whom He has particularly favored. How many little slights and irreverences have we been guilty of in His Sacred Presence; how many sallies of idle, vain or uncharitable thoughts; what bespatterings far worse than those which the Little Flower solovingly endured, are daily received by Him in His Blessed Sacrament through our carelessness, distractions or worldliness. Should we not then rejoice to endure in turn a little annoyance or inconvenience for love of Him?

To make reparation for all the indignities and outrages to which Jesus is subjected in His Blessed Sacrament is in a special way the purpose of Devotion to the Sacred Heart. It is a practice most urgently asked of us and most pleasing to Him. But to delight His Heart to the utmost we should imitate the tenderness, zeal and fervor of His Little Flower, making our own all the desires of His Eucharistic Heart and striving to live only for their fulfilment.

Entering the Carmel meant for her to live henceforth a life of love, devoted entirely to the Prisoner of the Tabernacle; spending herself in His service like a rose that yields up its sweetness and gladly. withers for Him; bearing all grief and pains undaunted only to give joy to Jesus and evermore lifting up, as she says, her heart to the rays of His white Host,

“Within that fire of love all self to burn away,

And like a Seraph blest to serve Thee night and day.”

Chapter III : Wishes Before The Tabernacle

ONDERFUL are the thoughts of Calderon

in his matchless dramas of the Holy Eucharist. Sublime are the eagle flights of St. Thomas, the Angelic Doctor, in his meghty song of the Blessed Sacrament, which the Church herself intones with worshipful solemnity. But sweet and glad and tender, full of child-like confidence and love, is that poem of the Little Flower which tells of her longings before the Altar, “My Wishes Before ie Tabernacle.”

As a prelude to her more complete develop ment of the same theme let me first quote her the exquisite verses of our poet priest o the South, Father Abram Ryan, expressin entirely similar wishes in the presence of th Eucharist. They strike the keynote of tha music whose full richness is unfolded in thé Little Flower’s song. Like David before th Ark, the white-stoled, consecrated singer pour forth his eucharistic longings before the Lord of his heart, dwelling here as a Prisoner of _ Love for him:

“T wish I were the little key That locks love’s Captive in, And lets Him out to go and free

A sinful heart from sin.

“T wish I were the chalice fair That holds the Blood of Love, When every flash lights holy prayer

Upon its way above.

“T wish I were the little flower So near the Host’s sweet face, Or like the light that half an hour

Burns on the shrine of grace.

“T wish I were the altar where, As on His mother’s breast,

Christ nestles, like a child, fore’er In eucharistic rest.

“But oh! my God, I wish the most That my poor heart may be A home all holy for each Host That comes in love to me!” [ 37 ]

Such is the sweet simplicity of true and noble poetry. The same deeply sincere, yet tenderly playful wishes arose in the soul of our Little Flower, St..Teresa of the Child Jesus, and they have doubtless suggested themselves to many another devout and poetic soul. But there is one quality which impresses itself upon us as peculiarly her own and constitutes the great charm of her writings as of her life. It is the supreme confidence she always placed in the love and merey of Almighty God. With infallible certainty she knew that whatever wishes God inspires, He also means to fulfil, and perhaps will realize them for us in far more wonderful ways than we could ever even imagine for ourselves.

“My little Mother,” she wrote in a note te her sister, Mother Agnes of Jesus, at a time when the hand of death was already sensibly upon her, “you will understand how this evening the vessel of God’s merey has overflowed for your child... Even now I know it! Yea, all my hopes will be fulfilled... Verily the Lord will work wonders for me, and they will infinitely surpass my boundless desires.”

In that delightful intimacy and confidence 9 her love lies also one of the greatest charms of her eucharistic poem.

Well, indeed, might she be tempted te envy, as she says, the little Tabernacle key which can at any hour open the eucharistic prison house. But is she not herself even more highly blest? Hers, in truth, is the wondrous gift of faith, that master key which can unlock for her at any moment the closed Dwelling of her Eucharistic Lord. Hers is the privilege, more highly favored even than the queenly Esther, to enter in unsummoned to her Lord, and _ to fly to the embraces of her Spouse and King. ‘His very Heart is opened for her that within it she can “safely hide.” And all these privileges we, too, may share with her. Charmingly, therefore, she sings:

“O little key! I envy thee, For thou canst ope, at any hour, The eucharistic prison house, Where dwells the God of Love and Power. And yet, oh tender mystery!

One effort of my faith alone Uniocks the Tabernacle door, And hides me there with Christ, my Own.” [ 39 ]

**Beside His altar blest with Him I gladly stay:

O, this is heaven for me.’’ 1 40]

So, in turn, she might envy the red altarlamp that there keeps vigil night and day; but cannot her own love burn with a light more steady and more true? Our own lives, too, like some rich aromatic oil, can constantly be consumed, as hers in all truth was to be, by the bright flames of Divine love. Like her, also we can labor to win souls for Christ, that they too may burn with love for Him through all eternity.