Blesseds Louis and Zelie Martin, parents of St Therese of Lisieux
July 12: Feast of Blessed Louis and Zelie Martin, parents of St Therese of Lisieux
But remember the devil will spoil the work if he can and by every means in his power turn you from your life of immolation.
COMMENT: In today’s snippet, Fr Doyle reminds us that we are contending not only against our own weakness in the spiritual life, but that the devil also wishes to distract us from closer intimacy with God, and that he will use “every means in his power” to turn us aside. Lucifer was the most brilliant of the angels and he has many means in his power. Perhaps most of all, he will use the defects in our own characters, which he knows so well, to turn us from the path of virtue.
Today it is somewhat unfashionable to refer to the Enemy, but if we wish to remove him from our life of faith, we shall be forced to erase a lot of the Gospel as well. True, perhaps previous generations were too focussed on the issues of evil influences, but perhaps we have allowed the pendulum to swing far too much in the other direction in recent decades. If we prefer to ignore the existence of our Enemy, we surely give a major advantage to him.
The efforts of the Enemy should spur us on to greater efforts, not cause us to shrink with fear. In this regard, it may be worth quoting some lines from the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius:
It is the way of the enemy to weaken and lose heart, his temptations taking flight, when the person who is exercising himself in spiritual things opposes a bold front against the temptations of the enemy, doing diametrically the opposite. And on the contrary, if the person who is exercising himself commences to have fear and lose heart in suffering the temptations, there is no beast so wild on the face of the earth as the enemy of human nature in following out his damnable intention with so great malice.
Finally, on this the feast (which, incidentally, is their wedding anniversary) of the married couple Blesseds Louis and Zelie Martin, let us pray for married couples and families, especially that they may remain strong against the temptations and efforts focused on weakening them.
First-rate post. Keep ’em coming!
Fr. Doyle, by the way, was a devotee of the child of these holy parents, though he did not even live to see her declared venerable.
Many thanks Anita.
Yes, Fr Doyle was indeed very fond of Therese. In fact, he adopted aspects of her spirituality of spiritual childhood, showing us that this approach to the spiritual life is most compatible with great heroism and asceticism.