J.M.+ J.T. Carmel of Lisieux
December 12, 1906
Jesus
My dear little Sister and child,
Just a few words while sending your bill1 to tell you that we are still at Lisieux, but that our Chapel is closed from today on2. I do not know how much time they are going to leave us in our blessed monastery. We live only in abandonment, but in peace all the same.
However, address your letters for your “little mother” to Monsieur Guérin, rue Banaston, Lisieux3.
If we leave in April, I will let you know. My little trustee4, it is permitted to place in this note a panegyric of a Blessed Martyr. I offer it to you with all my heart; guess the price of it5! If you knew what beautiful and touching feasts we have had! They were the last ones, alas, for a along time. Anyway, it will always be a feast in our hearts for our Jesus Whom we wish to love and to serve. Oh, that He would never be offended!
Since the opportunity presents itself before the time, I wish you in advance a good and holy new year, my beloved little Sister and daughter in Jesus. Do not forget me before your Reverend and good Mother and I ask that your Mother Prioress embrace you.
Your little Mother of Lisieux,
Sr. Agnes of Jesus, r.c.i.
Enclosed is a little new year’s gift. It is a poem that I composed in reparation, as you will see. They are selling it at my editor’s in Paris but we have some too at the monastery, a good number, at the price of 20 centimes each. I wanted also to send you “The Flight into Egypt1”, a pretty image with a poem by Thérèse. I miss her at this time.
If you do not find the poetry of reparation in this letter, it is because it already weighs too much for the mail. Remind me to send it to you another time.
We have news every day of our dear little sister. In all places she accomplishes her promise …2
1 The bill for articles ordered from the Carmel of Lisieux for Philadelphia.
2During the storm of persecution, The Bishop of Bayeux ordered the closing of the chapels of all monasteries in his Diocese during the week of December 9. The Carmel of Lisieux, however, remained where it was and the religious were never required to leave. The public chapel of the Carmel was re-opened in 1907.
3 This was perhaps a precautionary measure. M. Guérin (1841-1909), was the maternal uncle of the Mother Agnes and her sisters, and the father of Sr. Marie of the Eucharist (see Page 1, note 3). He helped finance the first edition of the Story of a Soul in 1898.
4 Sr. Stanislaus.
5 Possibly a holy card. Its whereabouts are unknown.
1“The Flight into Egypt” mean the picture; is difficult to determine which of Sr. Thérèse’s poems Mother Agnes is referring to.
2 Sr. Thérèse, on her deathbed in July, 1897, promised that she would “spend her heaven doing good upon earth” and “It will be like a shower of roses” (referring to the graces she would grant). The favors granted through her intercession began soon after her death and Mother Agnes was pleased to hear of the ones that were received in the United States through the spread of the devotion to her sister.