Hands of the faithful extended towards the reliquary surrounded by a glass enclosure, to be blessed. (Credit: N.B.)
There were ululations, fireworks, and applause on Monday to greet the relics of Saint Theresa of the Child Jesus at the Church of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Haret Sakhr, Jounieh.
An emotional crowd gathered on the grand staircase and church forecourt, surrounded by municipal police officers. Many faithful carried baskets of rose petals, a flower particularly cherished by the saint whose canonization centennial is celebrated this year, to scatter them over the reliquary.
This marks the second visit of the relics of this saint to Lebanon (the first being in 2002), who is famously quoted as saying, "I will return to Earth to make love loved." They arrived at Beirut airport (AIB) last Friday.
During her short life, this saint, a French Carmelite nun, left a remarkable mark on the Church. Born on January 2, 1873, she died of tuberculosis on Sept. 30, 1897, in Lisieux, France, at 24. After numerous testimonies of answered prayers by the one known as Theresa of the Child Jesus, she was beatified on April 29, 1923, and then canonized on May 17, 1925. Unknown during her lifetime, she left behind Memoirs titled "Story of a Soul," which earned her posthumous glory, and was proclaimed a Doctor of the Church by Pope John Paul II on October 19, 1997. This saint is celebrated every year on Oct. 1.
"I remember the first passage of her relics in Lebanon over 20 years ago, and the healings that accompanied them," exclaims Tatiana Helou, a faithful who came to welcome the relics at Our Lady of Perpetual Help on Monday. "These relics are a message of love and peace in this region torn by conflicts," assures Caroline, who carries a basket of petals and prepares to throw them as the relics pass by.
Salima Tanios is visibly moved as the convoy of cars transporting the reliquary approaches. "I have a special devotion to this saint whose intercession I felt one day when I was going through a serious health issue," she says.
In the border regions of South Lebanon
As the brown and gold wooden reliquary arrived in a municipal police car, young men delved through the crowd to carry the precious casket into the church under a rain of petals. Inside the church, Father Johnny Rai, the parish priest, recited several prayers with the crowd filing past the reliquary.
"At a time when missiles of hatred fall from the sky, it is the flowers of Jesus's love that Saint Thérèse sends us through her presence among us," says Father Rai to L’Orient Today, referring to the war between Israel and Iran, which erupted the same day the relics arrived, Friday.
"The strength of Saint Theresa is a spiritual strength, that of the heart of God, she who said that in the heart of the Church, she would be love," states Father Olivier Ruffray, vicar general of the Bayeux diocese and former rector of the Lisieux sanctuary, who is accompanying the relics in Lebanon as he did in 2002.
Regarding the coincidence between the arrival of the relics in Lebanon and the start of a major war in the region, he notes that "Saint Theresa often visits countries going through political crises," recalling that three years after her first visit in 2002, Lebanon was liberated from Syrian tutelage.
For Fady Fayad, coordinator of the committee that organized the arrival of the relics in Lebanon and member of the Jounieh municipal council, "the reception is triumphant everywhere as it was in this church, because the Lebanese have a special devotion to this saint, knowing that the first convent in the world named after her is located in this country."
To L'Orient Today he specifies that the relics, which will remain on Lebanese soil until July 20, will travel from Jounieh to Jbeil-Kesrouan to North Lebanon, before being displayed in the Bekaa and Baalbeck, then heading to South Lebanon where they will pass through the cities of Saida and Sour as well as the border region martyred by the last war with Israel. In a final stage, the relics will tour Baabda and Metn as well as Beirut.