Bonjoir, France! Rouen and Lisieux.

Our week of fall break was the last week of October, and I had been planning a pilgrimage to France with a Marian theme for some time now. We have been hearing the call of the Blessed Mother to draw closer to her this year, and so I really focused on outlining this trip around Marian apparition sites. We took RyanAir to Beauvis, France, picked up our rental car (after a free upgrade to larger car with GPS - thank you, Mother Mary!) and headed to Rouen for the night. 

The next morning we walked the streets of old Rouen as we munched on fresh croissants and fruit. It was drizzling, but the atmosphere was perfect, friendly, and perfectly French, including an accordion player sitting in the square.

In front of the Great Clock archway, which has been here since 1529!

Beautiful stone carvings underneath depicting the Lord as the Good Shepard.

Rouen Cathedral, which was even visited by Charlemagne at some point!

 

 

 

Side chapel of St. Joan of Arc. Joan was a heroine during the Hundred Years' War, who heard the voice of Saints Michael, Margaret, and Catherine instructing her to lead the French armies to drive the English out of France and to bring the Dauphin to Reims to be crowned king. After she achieved this, Joan was captured by the Burgundians, whose clerics tried as for witchery and heresy. She was burned at the stake here in Rouen.

Our last stop in Rouen was the old town square where St. Joan of Arc was burned at the stake. There is now a church adjacent, built in her honor.

That afternoon, we drove to Lisieux where one of the most famous woman doctors of the Church, St. Therese, lived and died. We visited the basilica first.

 

We were delighted to find the remains and beautiful casket of St. Therese's parents, Louis and Zelie, out for public veneration. They had just been canonized the weekend prior, so it was definitely a joyous atmosphere in Lisieux. I had just finished reading a book which compiles many of the letters of St. Zelie and I was reminded of her steadfast parenting and desire for her girls to stay far from sin and to love God above all. Since all 5 of their daughters entered religious life and one being a saint of the Church, they definitely fulfilled their parental vocation! In addition, the Martins were generous to the poor, remained faithful despite many tragedies that befell them, including the loss of two sons, and specialized in helping single persons find spouses, and couples to have children and to grow more in love for each other. What perfect patron saints for this day and age, when the cause for marriage and family is so threatened. St. Therese summed their characters up perfectly; "God gave me a mother and father more worthy of Heaven than of earth."

The right arm of St. Therese in a side chapel.

Then we drove down the street to visit the residence of the holy Martin Family. After reading so many books on their life as a child, I couldn't believe I was finally standing here where so much grace and miracles flowed.

Michael wanted to take a picture with "those saints". Nice casual pose there, buddy.

The bedroom upstairs where Therese was cured from a serious illness by the Blessed Mother.

Therese's hair that was cut when she entered the convent.

The bedroom of Sts. Louis and Zelie Martin.

The last room holds many of Therese's childhood possessions.

Her Sunday dress is on the left and her First Communion outfit is framed to the right. Below is the crucifix that St. Therese prayed in front of as a child, especially in the famous story when she heard about a vicious, hardened, murder that was soon to be executed. She prayed fervently for his conversion, and the night after his death, he came to her in a dream, saying he was in heaven because of her prayers.

The backyard garden were St. Louis and St. Therese spent much time together.

Then we returned back up the street to stop at the Carmelite convent of Lisieux.St. Therese entered here at the age of 16 where she lived a very exemplary holy life until her early death at age 24.
"My little way is the way of spiritual childhood, the way of trust and absolute self-surrender."

The grave of St. Therese (her body lies beneath the casket with the statue). The miraculous statue of our Lady that smiled at St. Therese as a girl, is above.

 

Costume of St. Joan of Arc made by St. Therese for the one-woman play she performed.

One of St. Therese's habits.

The door and entryway of St. Therese's first cell at Carmel, and these tiles are the very ones she walked on. "I entered Carmel to save souls and above all, to pray for priests."

 The Creed of faith that St. Therese wrote out when besieged by temptations and doubts concerning God and the afterlife - here she used her own blood. "I was ready to spill the last drop of my blood to profess the existence of Heaven."

The crown of flowers worn by St. Therese on the day of her profession. "I want no other Crown but You, my Beloved!"

"I will spend my Heaven doing good on earth. I will let fall from Heaven a shower of roses."