SAINT TERESA DE LOS ANDES

Feast Day - April 12

Lived (July 13, 1900 – April 12, 1920)

Patron Saint of ill People

This Chile's first saint is proof of the fact that one needs not to live too long to make impacts in this World.

Born in Santiago, Chile, Juana Fernandez Solar read an autobiography of Saint Thérèse - the little Flower. The life of Saint Thérèse strengthened her desire to serve God and cleared the path she would follow. When she was 19, she joined the discalced Carmelites, taking the name - Teresa.

The convent offered the simple lifestyle Teresa wanted and the joy of living in a community of women completely devoted to God. She focused her days on prayer and sacrifice. “I am God’s,” she wrote in her diary. “He created me and is my beginning and my end.”

As the end of her life drew near, Teresa started writing letters, sharing her thoughts on the spiritual life with many people. At age 20 she contracted typhus and quickly took her final vows. She died a short time later, during Holy Week.

Popularly known as the “Flower of the Andes,” Teresa is famous for the estimated 100,000 pilgrims who visit her shrine in Los Andes annually.

Pope John Paul II beatified her in 1987 and canonized her in 1993.