A few weeks ago, I was having lunch at the Vine with Natalie, when I learned more about her keen interest in Thérèse of Lisieux, such that I asked her to consider doing a Share the Wealth on the young Doctor of the Church. Stay tuned for that! Yesterday I happened to come along the following inspiring reflection from Sri Eknath Easwaran about her …
Because all of us are one, most personal problems and weaknesses are really very similar. As the Upanishad says, they differ “only in name and form.” Almost everyone is subject to insecurity, even those who appear most forceful; getting angry and throwing one’s weight around are signs of insecurity, not strength. Similarly, most of us are subject to dwelling on ourselves, often with negative feelings that can be terribly oppressive. In such cases anyone can feel inadequate, unable to cope with the responsibilities of the day.
Similarly, all of us have times when we are patient, days when we are kind, because beneath our passing, everyday personality, this transcendent Self is always present. It does people great harm to forget this and give them the impression that they are nogood by focusing attention on their faults.
Spiritual living means learning to do just the opposite. Whatever a person’s problems, we can learn to keep our attention always on the divinity within. After a while they start thinking, “Well, she must see something in me that I have never seen. Maybe it’s really there.” And slowly they begin to act on this belief.
Thérèse of Lisieux, a charming and very gifted saint of nineteenth-century France who died in her early twenties, was a great artist at this. In her convent there was a senior nun whose manner Thérèse found offensive in every way. Like many of her sister nuns, I imagine, all that she wanted was to avoid this unfortunate woman. But Thérèse had daring. Where everyone else would slip away, she began to go out of her way to see this woman who made her skin crawl. She would speak kindly to her, sometimes bring her flowers, give her her best smile, and in general “do everything for her that I would do for someone I most love.” Because of this unwavering love, the woman began to feel more secure and to respond to Thérèse’s attentions.
One day, in one of the most memorable scenes in Thérèse’s autobiography, this other nun goes to Thérèse and asks, “Tell me, Sister, what is it about me that you find so appealing? You have such love in your smile when you see me, and your eyes shine with happiness.”
“Oh!” Thérèse writes. “How could I tell her that it was Jesus I loved in her – Jesus who makes sweet that which is most bitter.”
Sometimes people tell me, “I can’t pretend like that! It’s hypocritical.” But Thérèse was not pretending. That divine spark at the core of personality is more real than anything else. In relating to Jesus in that sister rather than to her moods and caprices, she was relating to her real Self – and, by her constancy, actually bringing it to life.
