Saint Therese of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face, (also known as Therese of Lisieux) was a French Carmelite nun and is the patron of the missions.

SAINT THERESE OF LISIEUX

Saint Therese (born Marie-Francoise-Therese Martin) became a nun in 1888 at the early age of 15 and joined two of her older sisters in the cloistered Carmelite community of Lisieux, Normandy. After nine years as a Carmelite religious she died of tuberculosis at the age of 24.

The impact of her posthumous publications, including her spiritual autobiography The Story of a Soul, was significant and she became one of the most popular saints of the twentieth century.

She was beatified in 1923, and canonized in 1925. Therese was declared co-patron of the missions with Francis Xavier in 1927, and named co-patron of France with Joan of Arc in 1944. In October 1997 Pope John Paul II declared her the thirty-third Doctor of the Church, the youngest person, and only the third woman, to be so honoured.

2 January 1873

to 30 September 1897