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1900
July 13: Juanita
Fernández Solar is born in Santiago (Chile),
daughter of don Miguel Fernández Jaraquemada
and of doña Lucía Solar Armstrong.
July 15 : baptism
at St. Ann's church in Santiago.
1906
Juanita goes to
the Theresian Sisters school in Santiago where she
learns to read. She has a strong desire to do her
first communion but people think that she is too young.
Since her childhood,
Juanita stays often with her family at Chacabuco,
estate owned by her grand-father don Eulogio at 40
miles from Santiago. There she will have later a true
apostolate among the farmers and their families.
1907
Juanita goes as
a day student to the Sacred Heart school in Santiago.
May 13 : holy death
of her grand-father, don Eulogio Solar Quiroga.
Juanita's mother
inherits a large part of the Chacabuco estate which
is managed by don Miguel, Juanita's father. Unfortunately,
bad management will put the family in increasingly
difficult financial problems and will end by the sale
of Chacabuco in 1917.
Lucho, brother of
Juanita, teaches her how to pray the rosary. Juanita
promises to pray it every day and will keep her promise
until her death (except one day during her childhood
when she forgot it).
Juanita does her
first confession.
1909
October 22 : Juanita
receives the sacrament of confirmation.
1910
September 11 : Juanita
does her first communion, an event which she shall
treasure for life in her memory.
October 12 : birth
of Ignacio, Juanita's last brother.
1914
Juanita reads Story
of a Soul of Thérèse of Lisieux.
In December she
has an appendicitis surgery which makes her suffer
very much.
Juanita hears for
the first time the call of God to become Carmelite.
1915
Juanita becomes
boarder student at the Sacred Heart school in Santiago
with her sister Rebeca.
Juanita begins to
write her Diary.
December 8 : Juanita
does for the first time a temporary vow of chastity,
"promising to have no other Spouse than my Lord
Jesus Christ whom I love from all my heart and whom
I want to serve until the end of my life."
1917
January 3 : she
offers her life to God to save her brother Lucho from
his religious doubts. The Lord does not accept her
offering but tells her that her request shall be granted
later.
June 15 : she receives
the medal of Child of Mary.
The Chacabuco estate
is sold because of financial problems. Juanita's family
must change of house in Santiago and considerably
reduce its expenses.
July : Juanita reads
Elizabeth of the Trinity.
August : she does
a general confession and receives the assurance that
she never commited any mortal sin.
September 5 : she
writes for the first time to the carmel of Los Andes,
expressing her desire to become Carmelite. She asks
God to give her the strength to overcome the obstacles
to enter the Carmel: her poor health, the lack of
understanding from the part of her family and the
financial problems to get the dowry.
Decembre : she receives
many prizes at school.
1918
Juanita spends the
Summer at Algarrobo on the Pacific shore. She gathers
a parochial choir and teaches catechism.
August 12 : Juanita
leaves the Sacred Heart school and returns to her
family to substitute her elder sister Lucita who just
got married and to help her mother. She totally dedicates
herself to serve her family.
September 7 : she
writes to the carmel of Los Andes to ask for admission
and receives a positive answer.
She reads The
Way of Perfection of St. Teresa of Avila.
She helps in parochial
missions in Cunaco in the estate of her cousins Valdés
Ossa. One day, one of the missionary priests sees
her alone in the chapel in extasis in front of the
tabernacle.
She suffers from
doubts about her vocation: must she be a Carmelite
or a Sister of the Sacred Heart?
1919
January 11 : accompanied
by her mother, Juanita visits the carmel of Los Andes.
Her doubts vanish and she receives confirmation of
her Carmelite vocation.
March 25 : Juanita
writes to her father to ask for permission to enter
the Carmel.
April 6 : deeply
moved, her father don Miguel grants her permission.
Avril : Juanita
prepares her entrance into the carmel. While beeing
joyful to realize her vocation, she suffers very deeply
because she is going to leave her family which she
loves so much and which, she says, she would never
have left for a man.
May 7 : Juanita
enters the carmel of Los Andes and receives the name
of Teresa de Jesús (Sister Teresa of Jesus).
Despite the suffering due to the separation from her
family, peace and joy flood her soul.
Teresa follows the
Rule of the Carmel with humility and love. She offers
herself to do the humblest and most disagreable works.
Written from the
carmel of Los Andes, Teresa's letters radiate hapiness
and shall draw many of her friends to enter religious
life.
October 14 : Teresa
receives the habit of Carmel and begins her noviciate.
Teresa, has a strong
spiritual bond with her prioress but suffers from
misunderstanding and persecutions from the pedagogue
sister (who helps the prioress in the direction of
the novices).
Various spiritual
trials : tentations from the devil, dryness in silent
prayer. Teresa goes on in her total gift of herself
to Christ in great faithfulness to the Carmelite Rule.
1920
At the beginning
of March, Teresa assures Father Avertano, the Community
confessor, that she shall die within a month. She
asks for permission to do extraordinary penances.
The confessor does not believe her and answers her
that every Carmelite must be ready to die at every
moment; let she only keep the Rule.
Avril 1 : Holy Thursday.
Teresa begins her way of the cross following Christ.
She spends almost the entire day in the chapel.
April 2 : Goos Friday.
She participates in the liturgy. The novice mistress
sees her with a strong fever and asks her to go to
bed.
April 3: Teresa
endures terrible sufferings.
April 5 : she asks
for confession and communion. She suffers terrible
tentations of despair. The devil tries to convince
her that God has rejected her because of her unfaithfulness.
April 6 : arrival
at the carmel of Los Andes of doña Lucía,
Teresa's mother. She brings with her a written permission
of the Apostolic Nuncio to have Teresa leave the enclosure
to go to a good hospital in Santiago. The prioress
answers that Teresa would not accept this : if she
would die out of the enclosure, she would be considered
as having left the Order, which would be unbearable
for her. Doña Lucía understands that
the Lord asks her to offer him her daughter.
April 7 : Teresa
does her religious profession in articulo mortis.
The physicians' diagnosis is an advanced typhus .
Teresa receives communion for the last time.
April 12 : Teresa
dies at 7:15 pm.
April 14 : Burial
of Teresa. Surprisingly, the convent chapel is flooded
by people from Los Andes; they say they come to see
the little saint who just died of love, while they
did not know Teresa when she was alive. Thus the reputation
of holiness of Teresa is immediate.
November 23 : Rebeca,
sister of Teresa, enters the carmel de Los Andes.
She had understood that the Lord was inviting her
to substitute her sister. She receives the name of
Teresa del Divino Corazón (Teresa of the Divine
Heart). She shall die on December 31, 1942, with a
reputation of holiness.
1947
March 20 : beginning
of the Diocesan process in view of Teresa's beatification.
This process shall last until 1971 and shall be followed,
according to the Holy See's request, to a complement
of information.
1984
Death of Lucho (Luis
Fernández Solar), last surviving brother of
Teresa.
1986
March 22 : Pope
John Paul II signs the decree recognizing that Teresa
de Los Andes practiced in a heroic way the evangelical
virtues. Teresa can now be call "venerable".
1987
April 3 : Pope John
Paul II beatifies Teresa de Los Andes in Santiago
during his apostolic trip to Chile. Teresa is the
first Chilean raised to the honors of the altars.
Building in Auco
(near Los Andes) of a shrine to receive the tomb of
Teresa. New buidings for the Carmelite monastery are
also built near the shrine.
1993
March 21 : Pope
John Paul II canonizes Teresa de Los Andes in Rome
at St. Peter's.
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