A Sunday Thought From The Little Flower

St. Therese of Liseux, called "The Little Flower" remains one of my favorites. So today's Sunday thought will focus on her thoughts about becoming a saint.

Yes, we all want to be saints, right? How many times we've covered this! But no matter how many times, something's always missing - at least that's true for me. I'm convinced it's what I ought to do. I offer my sincere intention to God that I will strive to be a saint.

Nothing missing there. Sincere intentions make their way to God's Ear. We know this. Still something is missing.

Maybe it's the after-intention stuff. You state your case, confidently no less. Then the day begins. As good Catholics, we examine our conscience each day. Any saintly thoughts, words, or deeds today? Hmmm...seems like something's missing. Can't seem to find a single thought, word, or deed that might compare in any way, shape, or form with anything we know about the saints.

What to do?

How about starting all over again? That's what we're suppose to do, right? We fail to do what we intend, we count the shortcomings and falls. Add it all up, it comes to Saintly Stuff = 0. 

So when God gives us another day, we can thank Him and try, try again. 

What we can't do: get discouraged. Oh, we may feel some sense of discouragement, or at least some disappointment. But we need to set those feeling aside. They don't matter. If feelings mattered in our spiritual life, where would that leave us? Maybe some combination of confused, despondent, even despairing. No, feelings don't count. So we do our best to ignore them.

They're still there, of course. But we man up, take a deep breath, flex our soul's muscles and get back on our spiritual horse. 

Well, seems like this could go on forever! Where are the results? Shouldn't we feel saintly at least once or twice? But, no, we just got stuck on feelings again. Remember: Set them aside; ignore them best we can. They're essentially worthless. 

OK. Got it.

With all that swirling around my brain on this Sunday morning, it just seemed like the ideal time to plunk down these words from St. Therese:

“I have always desired to become a saint,” wrote St. Therese, “but in comparing myself with the saints I have always felt that I am as far removed from them as a grain of sand trampled underfoot by the passer-by is from the mountain whose summit is lost in the clouds. Instead of feeling discouraged by such reflections, I concluded that God would not inspire a wish which could not be realized, and that in spite of my littleness I might aim at being a saint.”

See how she set aside her feelings there? It sure looks like she experienced something akin to what's been swirling around here this Sunday. Imagine, something a saint thinks and says that's something like what we're thinking and saying.

There's hope!

Thank you, Saint Therese, dear Little Flower. You've made Sunday a day not only of rest, but of huge encouragement. We can pump this into our spiritual tanks and rev up our engines to start all over again. Maybe, with God's grace, we'll actually become saints sooner rather than later.

Meanwhile, if you haven't started your plan for 2024, get on it. You can check in during the week for some of our annual thoughts about how to go about doing this and why we try to get it done before Advent arrives.

Happy Sunday!