I’m a big fan of St. Thérèse of Lisieux … I have been ever since I found out that she struggled with anxiety disorders, as I do. She’s a great example of how sometimes you just need to rely on love and tenacious faith to overcome the dark times.
So I was especially thrilled when I came across this quote from her, talking about Mary:
For a sermon on the Blessed Virgin to please me … I must see her real life … They show us to her as unapproachable, but they should present her as imitable, bringing out her virtues, saying that she lived by faith just like ourselves, giving proofs of this from the Gospel.
In writing Mary and Me, I certainly found this to be true. Many women described how Mary often seemed distant, more a plaster statue than a real woman. Often, there was a critical moment in their lives when they realized that she was, as St. Thérèse says, imitable — and that all of us can relate to her, in ways that may take us by surprise.
(The quotation is from a great book called Spiritual Writings on Mary, edited by Mary Ford-Grabowsky.)
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