Won over to the Little Way

St. Therese of Lisieux.... she's like the popular girl at school.  Everyone talks about her, everyone gets her class picture.  It would be comforting if she would at least be a mean girl, and then you would be justified in your envious dislike of her - but she is among other things, the kindest, most loving person in the room.

Throughout my faith journey, St. Therese has been the one fly in the saint ointment for me.  I did not care to read Story of a Soul.  In college, I felt obligated to be inspired by her "little way," but instead I felt irritated.  She seemed so coddled, so perfect.  So loved and admired.  Her journey to God seemed too easy, too...little, for my taste.

Instead, I preferred saints of a stronger mettle - St. Teresa of Avila, who bravely discoursed with kings and popes, who spoke plainly and honestly and often made me laugh.  I preferred Mother Theresa of Calcutta, who got in and DID something.  St. Therese of Lisieux in a convent... my real, honest wondering was, what did she DO?

"We cannot do great things, but we can do small things with great love." - Mother Theresa

The funny thing is, that sometimes I have a sense that St. Therese adopted me somewhere along the way.  It would be just like her to choose the person who liked her least, and choose to love and pray for her, wouldn't it?  How annoying.  And yet, over the past several years, my opinion of her has begun to change. 

I was initially turned off by the "little" way, and how small the returns would be.  I looked for a grand design, a big plan.  Early in my faith, I wanted God's call for my life to be something BIG.  Ordinary things didn't inspire me.  I could see the need to love my brothers and sisters halfway across the world and just as easily ignore my brothers and sisters before me. 

Sometimes I think one of the greatest catchphrases that influenced my advent into the Catholic Christian lifestyle was "God has a big plan for your life." To quote Anne of Green Gables, this phrase has a lot of 'scope for the imagination.' In my imaginings, this plan would be monumental - a career as a Christian singer/songwriter, perhaps.  It would be fueled with important encounters with people in which hearts were changed, lives won over, in which everything grew in significance.  Life would be one long succession of great moments.

"Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin." 

  Mother Theresa   



Throughout my 20s, the more I searched for these moments, these evidences of a "big plan," the more frustrated I became.  Life was not moving along as expected.  Something must have gone wrong.  Either the phrase about God's "big plan" was just a flashy embellishment on the truth, or I had done something wrong because I didn't feel I was living according to a big plan. 

"Mother Theresa always said, "Calcuttas are everywhere if only we have eyes to see. Find your Calcutta." Shane Claiborne

And this is where, after years of pushing her away, St. Therese has reentered my life.  Where the hope of largeness and significance has left me disappointed, now the Little Way has begun to inspire me to a different kind of greatness.  Because, according to the Little Way, all that we do is important.

“It is love alone that gives worth to all things.”  St. Teresa of Avila 

According to the Little Way, where I live and work is not the point.  My success in God's plan has nothing to do with my success in "the real world." Whether I live in a convent, a cluttered apartment, or a large mansion, I can live the Little Way. 

According to the Little Way, my status, either single, married, a nun, does not matter.  I can love God and others in any one of these vocations, and if I love Him faithfully, I am a success in God's plan. 

According to the Little Way, my possessions, my career, the good and difficult things that happen to me - these are all useful, are all resources leading to the success of God's plan.  I can use anything in this world as material with which to love God, serve Him, follow Him.

“Christ has no body now on earth but yours,
no hands but yours,
no feet but yours,
Yours are the eyes through which to look out
Christ's compassion to the world
Yours are the feet with which he is to go about
doing good;
Yours are the hands with which he is to bless men now.” 

St. Teresa of Avila 



According to the Little Way, it doesn't matter if I share my music with a crowd of 5,000 people, 50,000, or 5.  If I play this music with love, I am a success in God's plan.

So, washing the dishes for my roommates is not just a chore, it's an act of love.  Smiling at the person who hurt my feelings, though hard, is an act of love.  Giving someone a glass of water, a kind word, when I could be doing something else, has value.  Making my own bed in the morning can be an act of love. 

"Miss no single opportunity of making some small sacrifice, here by a smiling look, there by a kindly word; always doing the smallest right and doing it all for love." 

St. Therese of Lisieux           



I no longer resent St. Therese of Lisieux.  Her Little Way has been a saving grace, a reminder of what really matters, in my 30th year.