The Saint Whose Husband and Daughter Are also Saints
Azélie-Marie Guérin was born two days before Christmas in 1831 near the small town of Saint-Denis-sur-Sarthon, France. Zélie, as she was known, from an early age aspired to be a nun, but was turned away by the Sisters of Charity of Saint Vincent de Paul due to her respiratory difficulties and recurrent headaches. She then prayed that God might send her many children and they would be consecrated to Him. In the meantime, she became a lacemaker manufacturing Alençon lace.
On the Bridge of St. Leonard, one fine spring day in 1858, Zélie passed a distinguished, but reserved, hardworking watchmaker. For Louis Martin, like the occasion when Dante first laid eyes on Beatrice on the Rialto Bridge, it was love at first sight. It was a most providential rendezvous. Zélie heard an interior voice, one she had learned to trust say to her, “This is he whom I have prepared for you.” Three months later, they were married on July 13. Louis had wanted to be a monk, but was turned down because he did not know Latin. From all indications, their meeting paved the way for a match made in heaven.
Their life together as husband and wife began on July 12, 1858, a date established by the Church as the feast day of the first husband and wife to be canonized as a couple. For the first 10 months of living together, they were celibate. They decided to consummate their marriage on the advice of their spiritual director.
Their life together was a model of holiness. They attended 5:30 AM Mass every morning and received communion as much as the custom allowed. They never worked on Sundays, were very generous with their time and money towards the poor, sought to perform works of mercy, and went out of their way to help people who were dying to receive the last rites. Their home was an ecclesia, a little church in itself.
If a prophet had told Zélie that she would become a famous lacemaker, marry the man whom God had sent her, give birth to five daughters who would enter into the religious life, of whom one would be declared a saint and Doctor of the Church, and another would have her cause for beatification officially opened, she would most probably have fainted on the spot, but with joy. And yet, that is exactly what happened.