18 CF 208.
19 CF 10.
20 CF 19.
21 CF 192.
22 CF 65.
23 CF 201.
24 CF 202.
25 CF 12.
26 CF 17.
27 CF 138.
28 CF 19.
29 CF 138.
30 CF 68.
31 CF 54.
32 A seventeenth-century French writer famous for her witty letters to her daughter.
33 CF 75.
34 A general-interest Catholic newspaper in France whose name means “The Cross.”
35 CF 80.
36 CF 120.
37 CF 102-a.
38 Pope John Paul II, on his first pastoral visit to France as pope in 1980.
Chapter 3
God First
A reader might be surprised at focusing on the Martins’ faith before looking at their family life and work. In so doing, however, we’re following in the “spirit” of the Martins which can be summarized in two words: “God first.”39 It’s impossible to understand the other aspects of their lives without reference to the source that guided them in all things.
The goal of Louis and Zélie, the dream of their youth and what they pursued all their lives, was holiness. “I want to be a saint,”40 Zélie affirmed, while Louis confided to his daughters, “Yes, I have a goal, and it is to love God with all my heart.”41 What did people mean by holiness at that time? The best way to achieve it was to be consecrated, or do miracles, or die a martyr, or even all three together. It would take the coming of the Martins’ daughter and the Second Vatican Council to remind us that holiness is accessible to everyone and required of everyone. This is still not completely clear in people’s minds today.
Louis and Zélie demonstrate that holiness is possible through the simple life of spouses. If in the fervor of youth they initially turned to the ideal represented by the consecrated life, they learned little by little from the Lord that holiness doesn’t reside in one’s state in life but in a trusting and loving response to God’s call in daily life. In ordinary life, where joys and crosses alternate, they gave themselves fully to God and to their neighbor, abandoning themselves to his will in all things. They achieved a holiness that was far from the more or less spectacular examples that were being presented in the hagiography of their day. Theirs was a holiness anchored in the real and the ordinary, which the Church is highlighting today.
The Martins’ desire for holiness wasn’t capricious. They took all the means available to reach it, especially all the preferred means of sanctification accessible to all Catholics: the sacraments, prayer, and parish life.
The Eucharist was, first of all, the center of their lives and the first activity of each day. At that time receiving the Eucharist at Mass was not a given. To receive Communion in the state of grace certainly implied regular confession and faithfulness to God’s commandments, but a concern to receive Christ appropriately was taken to extremes back then and deprived people of the grace of daily Communion. Having great hunger for the Eucharist, Louis and Zélie took Communion as often as possible: one or more times a week and all the First Fridays of the month. In being the first to arrive at morning Mass at 5:30 a.m., Louis and Zélie functioned, without their knowing it, like a prealarm clock. When the neighbors heard the first door on the street being closed, they would say, “It’s that Martin couple going to church, so we still have time to sleep.” Participating at Mass was less of an obligation for them than a privileged time in their Christian life.
Communion, above all, brought them joy, and that predilection was something they passed on to their children from their earliest years. “For a few weeks now we had taken her [little Thérèse] out on Sunday. She had not gone to Matthe, as she called it. In coming home from our walk, she let out piercing screams saying that she wanted to go to Matthe. She opened the door and took off under torrential rain in the direction of the church. We ran after her to bring her back home, and her crying lasted a good hour…. She said to me loudly in church, “I just went to Matthe! I prayded to God.”42
Participation at Mass wasn’t just a routine for them but a vital necessity, a refreshment and feast, even though they experienced the well-known difficulties that fatigue and worry can bring: “This morning I was sleeping as I dressed myself; I was almost sleeping as I was walking; I was sleeping at the first Mass when I was on my knees, standing up, sitting down, and as I prayed.”43 On another occasion, Zélie said, “There was sermon, but I am not sure what was preached because I was so absorbed in my thoughts.”44 Distraction and drowsiness were also Zélie’s lot, but meanwhile grace was working during Masses that she experienced without ecstasy: “This morning during Mass I had such dark thoughts about this [fear of losing the baby] that I was completely distressed”; however, demonstrating the fruit of this Mass, she added, “The best thing to do is to put everything back in God’s hands and calmly wait for events to unfold in abandonment to his will.”45
The Martins’ holiness in relationship to the Eucharist was evident in the importance they accorded it, not in any visible fervor. We see its importance for them first in the intense preparation that preceded every Communion for themselves and for the children as well. They didn’t hesitate to separate themselves from their daughter Léonie by sending her to boarding school at the Visitation Monastery with the single goal of having her prepare well for her first Communion. Preparing to receive God requires using all the small means in daily life—“It is a constant preparation that goes on every day,” according to Zélie46—as