Vigils Reading – Office for Vocations

FRATERNAL CHARITY

From the book “My Sister Saint Thérèse” by Sister Genevieve of the Holy Face 5

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Fraternal charity…was one of Thérèse’s favourite themes. She left no stone

unturned, therefore, to impress on her novices the supreme importance of this

virtue in community life… In order to encourage me in the practice of virtue,

Thérèse confided to me one of the sacrifices she was called upon to make during

her first years at Carmel.

As one of the former prioresses could not endure any fragrant odour,

<Thérèse>, in deference to her, had always been very careful not to have any sweet-

smelling flowers…at her cloister-shrine of the Child Jesus. It happened that, one

day, just as she was about to place a lovely rose before the statue of the Holy Child,

she heard the Mother calling her, and Thérèse knew why… My humble little sister

confessed when relating the incident to me, “I had a strong desire to let this good

nun go ahead and actually complain before I should tell her that it was only an

artificial flower. But at that same moment, Jesus was tugging at my heart for a

sacrifice of this little selfish satisfaction, and He won out. Holding up the flower, I

exclaimed gaily: ‘See, Mother, how well they imitate nature nowadays! Wouldn’t

you think that this rose had just been freshly gathered from the garden?’ Oh! If

you only knew how happy I was after that act of charity, and how marvellously it

strengthened my character.”

One day in the Infirmary during her last illness, my sister called my attention

to the soft, downy linens which the infirmarian, Sister Stanislaus always had at

hand for the benefit of her patients. “Souls should be treated with the same tender

care,” the Saint said, “but why is it that we forget this so frequently, and allow those

about us to go on unnoticed in the endurance of sharp, interior pain? Shouldn’t

the spiritual needs of the soul be attended to with the same charity, with the same

delicate care which we devote to our neighbour’s bodily necessities?… How

tenderly we should not only love them but also show our love for them.” Whenever

she happened to find any sister in a disagreeable mood or at fault in any other way,

Thérèse would extend herself to be only the more amiable, obliging and

affectionate; in this way she endeavoured to restore peace to an agitated heart

which, she knew, must be suffering…

Believing that I was too self-centered at times, our dear Saint said to

me…

“This tendency to fall back on self makes the soul barren and incapable of the

practice of virtue… Whenever we find ourselves a prey to such self-introspection,

we should have immediate recourse to external works of charity. <God> often

permits us to become obnoxious to ourselves precisely that we might get away from

self. Our only escape, then, is to go on a visit to Jesus and Mary by the performance

of charitable works.”

…

Thérèse frequently urged us to practise great charity in judging others, for,

as she used to point out to us, that which seems to be a fault in another is often an

act of heroism in the sight of God. The unfinished task of a nun who may be over-

tired or suffering interiorly, she told us, often brings more glory to God than a duty

meticulously completed by another nun robust of soul and body. In other words,

it is effort and not success that counts most with God…

When the tuberculosis had spread to all parts of her body causing

indescribable suffering, we were imploring heaven one day in tears to give our dear

little sister some relief when she said to us: “I am asking God that all the prayers

being offered for me may serve rather for the salvation of souls and not for the

alleviation of my sufferings.” And I can still hear her declare: “No, I never would

have thought it possible to suffer so much… never, never! I can only explain it by

my intense desire to save souls.”

 

5 Sister Genevieve of the Holy Face. My Sister Saint Thérèse. New York: P.J. Kenedy & Sons, 1959. 124, 129-132, 137-

138, 148-149.11