The Catechetical Review - Communicating Christ for a New Evangelization

The Spiritual Life: Saints Louis and Zélia Martin – A Married Love Caught Up Into Divine Love

Authored by Fr. Michael Berry, OCD in Issue #2.3 of Catechetical Review

St. Thérèse of the Child Jesus wrote, “God gave me a father and a mother more worthy of heaven than of earth,” and she called them “parents without equal.” Her saintly parents, Louis and Zélie Guérin Martin, were canonized in Rome on October 18, 2015, during the world Synod of Bishops on the Family—the first married couple with children to be canonized together. At a time in popular culture when the term “marriage” has been all but eviscerated by those denying its transcendent value or questioning its original purpose, the life of Louis and Zélie serves to prophetically illustrate marriage as a divine vocation and a true sacrament between man and woman, a means of growing in holiness. Even while Louis and Zélie Martin were a nineteenth-century French couple, they are refreshingly contemporary in their experience of marriage and family life. Not unlike many couples today, they married later in life by the standards of that age, when she was 27 years old and he was 35. They were both “young professionals.” From the age of 20, Zélie had owned a lace making business (which she continued as a wife and mother within the family home), managing several employees and personally assembling their embroidered work into the final product. So fine and well regarded was Zélie’s intricate “Point d’Alençon” lace, her business served as the appointed supplier to the clothier Maison Pigache of Paris. For his part, Louis was a master watchmaker and had established his shop in Alençon where he repaired time-pieces and sold jewelry for some eight years before meeting Zélie.

The rest of this online article is available for current subscribers.

Start your subscription today!


This article is from The Catechetical Review (Online Edition ISSN 2379-6324) and may be copied for catechetical purposes only. It may not be reprinted in another published work without the permission of The Catechetical Review by contacting [email protected]

Articles from the Most Recent Issue

Inspired Through Art: Our Preferential Option for the Poor
By Jem Sullivan
“The option or love of preference for the poor . . . is an option, or a special form of primacy in the exercise of Christian charity, to which the whole tradition of the Church bears witness. It affects the life of each Christian inasmuch as he or she seeks to imitate the life of Christ, but it applies equally to our social responsibilities and... Read more
From the Shepherds: Serving the Poor: Taking Five Steps with Two Feet
By Bishop William Wack, CSC
Free When I served as director of André House, a ministry of hospitality to the poor and homeless in downtown Phoenix, we often spoke about “the two feet of service”: direct service to those in need and working for justice and a long-term solution. Both are important, and each one informs and strengthens the other. Inspired by Dorothy Day and under the... Read more
Radically Available
By Lani Bogart
Free In prayer after receiving Holy Communion, I recognized in my heart the voice of God the Father. “I want you to be radically available.” As Director of Religious Education in a large parish, I had an idea of what it meant to be radically available while working full time. It meant being available to God by showing up for daily Mass and prayer. It... Read more

Pages

Watch Tutorial Videos

We've put together several quick and easy tutorial videos to show you how to use this website.

Watch Now