Message from Fr. Manny Alvarez

Church of the Little Flower, Coral Gables (St. Theresa)

My Dear Friends,

As we begin this Advent season, we welcome all of our visitors who are coming to the Church of the Little Flower this week to venerate the relics of our patroness, St. Therese of the Child Jesus. This is going to be a hectic week for our parish that begins on Monday with the blessing of our outdoor Nativity Scene. Then on Tuesday, the relics of the Saint arrive with great fanfare and welcomed by our archbishop that evening with an official Welcoming Mass for these relics that have spent the last two months journeying through the United States. While the relics are here in the church, over at the school carnival rides will begin to arrive as next weekend we have our annual Parish Fair.

So there is indeed a great deal of activities on our campus, but let us not allow the frenetic nature of this week distract us from the reality that we enter into today: the Advent season and our spiritual preparation to receive Christ this Christmas. For this we look to our patroness as many of us will this week along with our many visitors. We look to the wisdom of St. Therese who is a doctor of the Church.

St. Therese invites us to follow the little way to lead us to God. The little way invites us to silence, which is something so necessary during the Advent season. Remember that Therese lived her religious life in the silence of a cloistered convent. She is known for saying “silence does good for the soul.” It is in silence that we truly encounter the Divine. Just look at our Adoration Chapel across the street. So many of you gather in silence to adore the Lord present in the Blessed Sacrament. Therese expressed this longing for the Lord when she said, “O Jesus! on this day, you have fulfilled all my desires. From now on, near the Eucharist, I shall be able To sacrifice myself in silence, to wait for Heaven in peace. Keeping myself open to the rays of the Divine Host, In this furnace of love, I shall be consumed, And like a seraphim, Lord, I shall love You.”

Like St. Therese, let us embrace silence we enter this holy season of Advent. Let us embrace silence as we receive her relics this week as we pray for graces and a shower of roses to descend upon our parish this week. And finally, let us embrace silence as we prepare our hearts for Christ, our newborn King this Christmas.

God bless you all,

Fr. Manny Alvarez