Located southwest of Rouen in the Normandy region, Lisieux is a market town in an agricultural region noted for its cheeses (Camembert, among others). The town was not damaged much during World War II but has few historic buildings of note, one of the most famous being St. Peter's Cathedral dating from the 12th and 13th centuries. The fame of the town largely is due to is being the home of St. Therese of Lisieux (1873-1897), who came to the town as a child, joined a religious order at age 15, and spent the remaining 10 years of her life as a Carmelite nun in the convent at Lisieux. Canonized in 1925, she was declared a "Doctor of the Church" in 1998 because of the importance of her writings.