STetc ch 24 more Terike

[Mark Kohut]

St Theresa was, to many sensitive very Catholic boys of my generation, like
me I flatter myself. The felt puppy-like “love” warmed some of us.



On Sat, Aug 15, 2026 at 4:02 AM Michael Bailey via Pynchon-l <
pynchon-l at waste.org> wrote:

> She apparently just started thinking of herself as named after Maria
> Theresa, although one doesn't exactly associate that personage with
> motorcycle couriering.
>
> But then after years - she surely took her time - her mother informed her
> that she'd actually named Terike after the Catholic saint St Therese
> (1873-1897), and there is a Society of the Little Flower devoted to that
> saint.
>
> https://www.littleflower.org/learn-about/
>
> Born to extremely religious parents - all 5 of their daughters became nuns
> - difficult life (per Wikipedia) -
> Jack Kerouac as an altar boy used to pray to her.
>
> What is she famous for?
>
> Truncated version: she believed in loving God more than fearing, and she
> conceptualized herself as "little", eschewing overly ambitious devotions -
> but certainly there's more to her than that
>
>
> Henri Bergson - who was Jewish but interestingly drew closer to
> Catholicism in his later years - wrote that he was impressed with her:
>
> "One reason why the philosopher Henri Bergson esteemed Therese so highly
> was that he was fascinated by the qualities of character which prompted her
> to confront the Pope...[whilst on a pilgrimage to Rome for the priestly
> jubilee of Pope Leo XIII] ... in pursuit of her own desires ... explicitly
> forbidden by the chaplain to address Leo XIII, Therese flouted the
> injunction ... she was dragged away by two papal guards. This is hardly the
> simpering and docile saint which Therese's statuary too often suggests."
>
>
>
>
> One would be hard-pressed to think of 2 women with such different
> approaches to life as Maria Theresa and St Therese.
>
> Hegelian synthesis: motorcycle courier?
> --
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>