How I wish I had become a priest so that I could preach about the Holy Mother. First, I would explain how little we know about her life: We should not say things that are improbable or what we do not know; for example, that when she was very small, at the age of three, the Holy Virgin went to the temple to offer herself to God with fervent and completely extraordinary feelings of love; while she may have gone there quite simply out of obedience to her parents. (…)
In order for me to like a sermon about the Virgin Mary and for it to benefit me, I need to see her real life, not the presumed life; and I am sure her real life must have been very simple. They show her to us as unattainable; however, it should be shown that it is possible to imitate her…
(Thérèse of Lisieux, Last Conversations, August 21, 1897)
