Introduction

Pauline Martin was the second-eldest sister of St Thérèse of Lisieux.  On December 8, 1860 Zélie Martin – mother of Marie, and later of Pauline, Léonie, Céline and Thérèse – prayed for the gift of another baby girl.  She asked for a girl who ‘…was capable of becoming a saint.’¹ Zélie’s prayer was answered on the Vigil of the Nativity of the Holy Virgin on September 7, 1861 when she gave birth to Pauline.  She was a mischievous child who resembled Zélie in looks and character, with her dark hair, dark complexion and small stature, and from an early age Pauline was naturally loving and virtuous.  She was close to God because she knew God was close to her, a reality that stayed with her throughout her life. Could a child be so naturally good while so young?  If we consider an excerpt from Zélie’s letter to Monsieur and Madame Guérin (Zélie’s brother and sister-in-law), we can see how Pauline was a normal child.  Zélie wrote, ‘She enjoys dressing up […] until she was twelve, she was very lively, […] I did not spoil her […] as little as she was, I didn’t let her get away with anything.’²  Zélie had a sister, a Visitation nun in Le Mans, Sr Dosithée.  Attached to her convent was a school attended by Pauline and Marie as boarders.  Sr Dosithée kept Zélie informed as to their progress and welfare during term time.

Pauline’s First Holy Communion

On July 2, 1872, aged nearly eleven, Pauline made her first Holy Communion in the Visitation convent chapel.  As time passed, the idea of becoming a nun was never far from her thoughts.  Sr. Dosithée summed up Pauline’s character in a letter to Zélie, “It’s a pleasure to have this child; everyone loves her, she is so tender and so kind; if the good Lord keeps her on earth, she will be a happy mortal; she puts up with everything, she is always in agreement […] For myself, only to see her makes me happy; she is so joyful and she has such a lovely way about her” (MAJ).³

Zélie’s Illness and Death

Sadness enveloped the Martin family when Zélie, who had been fighting breast cancer, resigned herself to the reality of her forthcoming death.  Zélie wrote to Pauline, “Oh, my Pauline, you are my treasure.  I know well that you will be a nun, and that you will become a saint:  I am not worthy to have a daughter like you, you are my glory and my happiness” (MAJ). Pauline left the Visitation school on August 1, 1877 and Zélie died twenty-seven days later.

The Two Orphans

After Zélie’s funeral the family gathered together in the parlour at their home where a famous incident took place.  Thérèse described it in her memoirs:

All five of us were gathered together, looking at each other sadly.  Louise [the maid] was there too, and seeing Céline and me, she said: “Poor little things, you have no mother anymore!” Céline threw her arms around Marie saying: ‘[…] you will be my Mama!’ Accustomed to following Céline’s example [Thérèse] turned instead to you, Mother, [Pauline] and as though the future had torn aside its veil, I threw myself into your arms, crying: ‘Well, as for me, it’s Pauline who will be my Mama!’ (SS, p. 34).⁴

Pauline, in the midst of her own grieving, became a second mother to Thérèse, one sensitive soul caring for another sensitive soul.  For Pauline and indeed all the family, a new era had dawned.

Pauline’s Input and Care for Thérèse

Pauline became Thérèse’s role model where Pauline’s generous nature was put to full use.  Where did Pauline gain such strength to carry out her new role so soon after her mother’s death?  The answer to this question can be found in one of Pauline’s ‘Little Counsels to Thérèse.’  She wrote, ‘How sweet it is not to know what Jesus has in store for us in the future.  It is most sweet to live from day to day in abandonment, useless, if He wishes.  But what in this world is useful, if not the love of God alone?  We abandon ourselves and all we love to His love. And how well we can rely on that!’⁵  Pauline worked extremely hard with Thérèse, teaching her to read, write, draw, paint and, importantly, pray, until October 1881, when Thérèse became a half-boarder at the Benedictine Abbey school.  Pauline believed that her work with Thérèse had come to an end.  At this time, Pauline was busy preparing Céline for herFirst Holy Communion.  Pauline also made lace, embroidered an alb and painted on parchment and ivory.  It was recalled how Pauline created ‘verse which her little sisters recited to their father, or to Aunt Guérin. She composed playlets and handed out parts to the young actresses Céline, Thérèse and their cousins.  In a word, she was a presenter and a sower of happiness and she stayed this way until the end of her life’ (MAJ).

Pauline’s Religious Vocation

Pauline, now aged twenty, believed she could no longer ignore her call to religious life.  Initially she felt she had a vocation to the Visitation Sisters but she discovered that the permitted age for entrants was between twenty-one and twenty-three.  She realised she had a little while to wait and planned to continue caring for Thérèse and the family while she waited.  However, at the church of St Jacques, in the Chapel of Notre-Dame du Mont Carmel, Pauline described an experience during Mass: ‘Suddenly a light flashed through my soul, and God showed me clearly that He did not wish me to go to the Visitation but to the Carmel…  I had never thought of Carmel, and in the one moment I found myself being impelled there with an irresistible attraction’ (MAJ).

When Pauline returned home from church, she shared her experience with Marie, her elder sister.  Marie’s initial response was one of sorrow because she enjoyed having Pauline with her at home to help her with household chores and to accompany her on walks together.  Marie also believed Pauline’s health was too fragile; Carmelite convents were well known for their austere way of life at that time.  Pauline’s response to Marie was typical of her sensible yet mystical approach to life. Seeking to comfort Marie, Pauline pulled out in front of her a spiritual bouquet from her beloved book of The Imitation of Christ and quoted: ‘Food, drink, clothes and other necessities to maintain the body are burdensome to a fervent spirit.’ (bk. II, ch. 26)

Seeking Permission to Enter Carmel

Pauline asked her father, Louis, for his permission and blessing to enter Carmel.  He did not object and she suspected from her father’s reaction that he was proud of her decision.  She wrote, ‘I saw that in his heart he was very proud to find that I had a vocation.  In the afternoon I met him mounting the stairs, and he seemed a little sad.’  He turned round on the stairs and said to her, ‘Do not think …that if I am happy to give you to God, I shall not suffer in parting with you’, and he embraced her ‘with tender emotion’ (MAJ).  Louis was the essence of kindness and generosity and Pauline appreciated his love.  She expressed her own love for her father in letters she wrote to him.  ‘Oh, what happiness to have a father like you, what happiness and what honour!  We will all become saints to reward your zeal and to thank God’ (MAJ).

Pauline presumed Lisieux Carmel would be full to capacity and requested to be presented at the Carmel convent in Caen.  The Lisieux prioress, however, Mother Marie de Gonzague, assured Pauline that a cell would be found in their convent for her, and during her second visit to Lisieux Carmel, she learned that not only had she a cell waiting for her in Lisieux, but also her name in religion would be Sister Agnes of Jesus.

Pauline’s Entry into Carmel

October 2, 1882 finally arrived, ‘a day of tears and blessings…’ (SS, p. 59).  On that day Louis Martin took Pauline to Lisieux Carmel.  The nuns described the event:

Monsieur Martin, accompanied by Marie and Monsieur Guérin, drove Pauline to Carmel himself.  On the doorstep of the cloister stood the Canon Delatroёtte, superior of the monastery, and the Abbé Ducellier, Vicar of the Cathedral of St. Pierre and its future archpriest.  In his position as director the Abbé addressed some moving words to his spiritual daughter.  Then the convent door closed, the community embraced the new arrival and they found her so pale from emotion that they wanted her to sit down.  She firmly protested “But I am not ill!”  They smiled and understood from her response that the little postulant was not lacking in energy.

Next day the mistress of the noviciate, our holy founder, Mother Geneviève of St Teresa, finding her a little pensive, questioned her: 

‘Are you sad?’

‘Yes, Mother.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I have come old to Carmel.’ (MAJ)

Pauline was twenty-one years old at the time!

Pauline’s Religious Vows

On May 8, 1884 Pauline, now Sister Agnes of Jesus, pronounced her vows to Mother Geneviève of St Teresa.  On the same day, Thérèse received her first Holy Communion in the Benedictine Abbey in Lisieux.  Later that day Thérèse was taken to Carmel to visit Pauline. Pauline later wrote about her visit: ‘At the end of the afternoon, I saw my little Thérèse in the parlour, with her veil as white as my own. […] What a moment for us both.  I went out quite comforted, a little like the apostles when they descended from Mount Tabor…’ (MAJ).

Pauline’s Achievements while Prioress of Lisieux Carmel

Pauline was elected Prioress on February 20, 1893.   She was heavily involved in the publication of Thérèse’s memoirs Story of a Soul after Thérèse’s death. Memoirs were circulated to the Carmelite convents following the death of a sister.  This book became extremely popular with the general public, too, and has never been out of print since its first publication.  Pauline was involved in the Vatican inquiry of the beatification of Thérèse which required the writing of many letters and visits from Vatican cardinals and priests.  These visits meant many hours spent in the parlours of Carmel, which Pauline was not fond of.  She is recorded to have said, ‘My purgatory is the parlours’ (MAJ).

Pauline was heavily involved in organising the construction of the Basilica of St Thérèse.  Pope Pius XI wanted to inaugurate the Basilica of Lisieux himself, had his health permitted. Mother Agnes wished to thank the Pope through his legate, Cardinal Pacelli, and she wrote: “Most Holy Father, only my sainted little sister can give thanks to Your Holiness for such a completely unexpected privilege” (MAJ).

Eighty Days in the Crypt of the Basilica of St Thérèse

From June 6, 1944, the Lisieux Carmelites underwent eighty unforgettable days living in the Basilica of St Thérèse.  The details we have today of their time spent in the Basilica are memoirs from the sisters who lived in the community with Mother Agnes of Jesus, along with the priests and seminarians of the Mission of France who were also in the Basilica at the time.   Lisieux was experiencing heavy bombing during World War II in 1944 and it was thought the nuns should evacuate their convent and find safety elsewhere.  On July 25, Mother Agnes wrote to the Carmel of Chambéry: ‘Let us hope that we are not obliged to leave Lisieux.’ (MAJ)  The nuns were praying Lauds when ‘a plane falls on the train station with an infernal siren noise.  A bomb explodes.  Carmel shakes.  Pieces of window fall on our heads. […] Mother Agnes […] was under the cloister […]   She asked us to go in to finish the Office, after which she invites us to sleep […] wherever we wanted, as there was no cellar.’ (MAJ).

Night was approaching.  ‘Mother Agnes had climbed up to the attic to see the damage.  At the same time Monsignor Augros, superior of the Mission of France, calls to her […] from the sacristy: “Mother, you are responsible for the sisters.  Tonight, you must come and sleep at the Basilica!” – “But why tonight?” – “Because everything will burn, Mother!”  Mother Agnes assembled everyone.  “Each of you take a blanket and we shall all go to the Basilica.” […] the Prioress still hoped to return to Carmel the next day…’ (MAJ).

The following day a few of the sisters, helped by some seminarians, went down to Carmel to bring back the relics of St Thérèse.  ‘A priest from the Mission of France was tending to an injured person as night was falling.  He was not able to hold a candle in one hand, to give light to what he was doing and make a bandage with the other.  Noticing a Carmelite who was watching him he told her, a little brusquely, “If you could hold the candle for me, it would help a lot.” The sister immediately took the candle: it was Mother Agnes!’ (MAJ).

On August 27, 1944 on the Feast of the Transverberation of Saint Teresa of Avila, the sisters returned to Lisieux Carmel.  A sister capturing that moment wrote, “The Community form a procession, we bring back the reliquary of Saint Thérèse.  The crowds follow us with a show of emotion.   Entering the cloister Mother Agnes kisses the niche of the Child Jesus who seems to say: ‘I have protected you well!’  Then she goes and opens the grille of the choir and we see the crowd who has come to venerate the reliquary” (MAJ).

On the evening of the same day, August 27, Mother Agnes of Jesus gave a homily; she spoke from her soul: ‘My heart, as yours, is full of unspeakable gratitude.  No doubt we have suffered, but how much has our suffering been sweetened! […]. We have been able to continue to sing our Office […] Our exile has been softened by several daily Masses with the […] priests, in this crypt marvellously edified to the glory of our little Thérèse.  We have been able to contemplate her splendid Basilica […] May Thérèse help us to take up our religious life once more with fervour […] Let us think of the words of Joan of Arc: “take everything as it comes.‘

Conclusion

Pope Pius XI established Pauline as ‘Prioress for life’ of Lisieux Carmel in 1923.  She was Prioress from 1893 until her death in 1951. She was the ‘kingpin’⁶ in the publication of St Thérèse’s autobiography, Story of a Soul, in 1898.  Following the publication, Mother Agnes of Jesus coped with numerous visits from pilgrims, bishops, cardinals and theologians and replied to excessive correspondence as a sister of St Thérèse.  After Thérèse’s death, she dealt with the enormous workload involved with the Beatification and Canonisation of St Thérèse.  Pauline was greatly respected for her wisdom, sincerity and discernment, not just by her community who loved her dearly, but by the many people she encountered throughout her life.  She remains an encouragement and guide in our own spiritual journeys, and I believe and pray that one day, like her sister Thérèse, she will be declared a saint and fulfil Zélie’s wishes.

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1. Memorial letter sent to all Carmelite convents following Pauline’s (Mother Agnes’s) death. ↩︎
2. Ibid. ↩︎
3. MAJ = Carmelites of Lisieux, Mother Agnes of Jesus. ↩︎
4. SS = Story of a Soul: The Autobiography of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux. Trans. John Clarke, OCD (Washington, DC: ICS Publications, 1996). ↩︎
5. Little Counsels of Mother Agnes of Jesus, OCD (Carmelite Monastery of Lisieux, 1982), p. 13. ↩︎
6. Jean Vinatier, Mère Agnes de Jesus. ↩︎