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    THÉRÈSE OF LISIEUX

    Join us for a morning of study and chant as we depart beyond her "Little Way"

    Thérèse of Lisieux, known in English-speaking countries as “The Little Flower” is sometimes reduced to sugary language. When Pope John Paul II made her the third woman Doctor of the Church, he spoke only about her center on love, on doing every little thing with love as her well-known Little Way.  Thérèse's "Little Way" is at the core of her writings, but there is also much more to her.  Thérèse suffered strong psychological distress that had its roots in multiple maternal losses. She wrote about her struggles with faith when she was dying from tuberculosis at 24. She also had a strong desire to be a priest that is mostly discounted by church authorities, but has been embraced by those supporting the ordination of women and some very well-known French writers. Many of her “less orthodox” teachings, her psychological distress, and her struggles with faith continue to be mostly unknown.

    In this seminar we will present details Thérèse’s life, her writings, her contemplative teaching and practices and we will attempt to understand her as a young woman of

    How Saint Thérèse of Lisieux helped my gay comrade when dying of AIDS

    I met Adrian Kellard in 1986. At the moment, I was 20 years old, living at the Catholic Worker on the Lower East Side of Manhattan and still in the closet. An openly gay co-worker brought me to meet Adrian as he was setting up his first solo art show at a gallery in SoHo. 

    Adrian’s artwork blew me away. He etched and carved and painted radiant bold colors on wood planks and constructed them into holy images: crucifixes, virgins and saints. Many of his works were altarpieces surrounded in rays and stars and flowers. I saw reflections of Rouault, Van Gogh, Michelangelo, Giotto.

    Many of the sacred images, particularly those of Christ, were at once muscular and tender; the feeling they conveyed was both devotional and nakedly homoerotic. Walking into that gallery felt appreciate crossing into the threshold of an extraordinary church, one where queerness and devotion were fused together. 

    To witness a lover of God who fully standard his queerness helped me find the courage to likewise accept myself.

    Adrian was no less striking than his art. When I first saw him, he was up on a ladder, wearing big ebony combat

    The Transgendered Sexual Imagery of St. Theresa of Lisieux (1997)

    In a recent email, concerning the elevation of the 19th century French mystic St. Theresa of Lisieux to the status of "Doctor of the Church", Luis T. Gutierrez wrote:

    I wonder what might be the significance of this for the ordination of women in the RCC, since Therese expressed a desire for the ministerial priesthood. Would the RCC call "doctor of the church" a person who has written what Cardinal Ratzinger recently described as a "grave doctrinal error"?

    Prof. Guiterrez did not specify the passage he referred to, but it was posted by Gerald Bugge, with an accusation:

    Here's the entire (beautiful) passage you relate to to, claiming that Therese "expresses a desire for the ministerial priesthood." How could you so twist these magnificent words to further your own ends and attempt to disparage Josef Ratzinger. See her crave in its context! And maybe we can all deepen our love for the Church through this great saint, truly deserving to be a Medic of the Church:

    In fact, although Gerald sees the passage as "magnificent", he overlooks, as indeed he must in

    I am gay and autistic. What does that express for my Catholic faith?

    Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in 2022. Outreach is re-publishing it following comments from Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., made on Apr. 16, 2025, in which he called growing autism rates an “epidemic” and suggested that people with autism live less full lives than people without autism. Those comments drew condemnation from some advocates for people with autism.

    Each one of us has our own problems and trials. For some, it is the struggle of dealing with peer pressure and injustices. For others, it is people’s indignation and selfishness.

    For me, a dilemma I tackle every day is the fact that I am autistic and gay. And I know that some conservative members of the church see lesbian, same-sex attracted, transgender and bisexual people as both a threat and threat to the current status quo.

    This is a perspective that is misconstrued and must be addressed from someone who faces it on a daily basis. I want to give you the opportunity to set yourself into my shoes.

    The dilemma that I face is being right to myself as a member of the LGBT community, while s gay lisieux

    ‘A man must go away his father and mother and attach himself to his wife.’

    Philip Endean SJ, Professor of theology at the University of Oxford,  noted in the opening words of his sermon to the Soho Mass last Sunday, that

    “The connection between today’s scripture and the lived experience of this congregation is … well, interesting.”

    As it happens, one of the books I have been reading recently is Endean’s “Karl Rahner and Ignatian Spirituality”, based on his control doctoral thesis on the subject. The German Karl Rahner is notoriously complicated to read – his own brother once remarked that someone should “translate his writing into German. ”  I have appreciated the clarity of Endean’s exposition, making Rahner’s dense thought easily intelligible, so I was looking forward to his homily.  He did not disappoint.

    By starting with the other theme in the Gospel,

    ‘Let the little children come to me’ ‘Anyone who does not welcome the Kingdom of God as a short-lived child will not enter it at all’

    and continuing by comparing this image to the spirituality of St Therese of Lisieux (whose relics are currently on tour around the U