Declared venerable by Pope St. John Paul II in 1994 and beatified in 2008, the Martins are believed to be the first parents of a saint to be canonized.

Born in Alençon, France in 1873, Thérèse Martin made a trip to Rome at the age of 15 to make a personal request of Pope Leo XIII for special permission: entering the Carmelite monastery of Lisieux.

O venerable St. Thérèse of the Child Jesus,
who promised to bless us with a shower of roses,
we ask that during this time
you shed the fragrance of your roses.

-Fr. Luis Gerardo Belmonte-Luna, OCD