The relics of St Therese of Lisieux – one of the Catholic Church’s most revered saints – are currently touring the parishes of England, drawing tens of thousands of pilgrims to pay their respects and pray for help from the bones of the woman known as The Little Flower of Jesus.

St Therese’s remains, however, will not be making the journey here, meaning Scottish Catholics have had to clamber aboard buses and travel hundreds of miles to pay homage to the French Carmelite nun and patron saint of the sick, who died in 1897, aged just 26.

There is upset among Catholics that it was a decision taken by the Bishops’ Conference of Scotland which resulted in the relics not coming here.

The relics have been touring the world for 12 years and arrived in England a few weeks ago.

Determined Scots Catholics had to hire buses and set off to join the pilgrimage as the relics began the English leg of their world tour in Portsmouth. The relics end their UK travels this week at Westminster Cathedral in London.

Parishes across the central belt have organised bus trips down south to make the religious pilgrimage.

Almost 80,000 pilgrims have come to venerate the relics since their arrival in Britain last month. According to the figures on the official St Therese website, there were 17,000 visitors in Liverpool and another 30,000 went to see the relics in Salford, Manchester.

Some 2000 people lined the streets in Leeds when St Therese was brought into the city. The visit of the relics to the city’s St Anne’s Cathedral drew another 14,000 people. The city’s Bishop Arthur Roche said that St Therese was “a saint for modern times”.

St Therese even drew crowds to York Minster – the only Anglican stop during the tour of Britain.

To date the relics have visited nearly 40 countries, including Brazil, Russia, Kazakhstan, the US, Ireland, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Burkina Faso in West Africa, Lebanon and Iraq but not Scotland … even though, ironically, the country has long held a shrine for the saint at Lanarkshire’s Carfin Grotto.

Wherever the relics have gone, people have claimed to experience conversion and healing.

Hugh Farmer, former editor of the Scottish Catholic Obersever and correspondent for The Tablet, said the decision not to bring the relics to Scotland “mystifies many Catholics who have and will continue to have a great following of St Therese”.

He added that for Scotland to miss out on the event was “a tragedy”, adding: “The decision has obviously been taken by the Bishops’ Conference but is a pity that they did not ask the people as I am sure they would have had a 100% ‘yes’.”

The Scottish Catholic Church said: “Several months ago the members of the Bishops’ Conference of Scotland were informed that the Relics of St Therese of the Child Jesus were to be taken to various places throughout the world, including England. The Bishops’ Conference was asked to consider whether or not they thought it be appropriate to designate a location or several locations in Scotland where the relics could be taken.

“Having given the matter due consideration the members of the Bishops’ Conference came to the conclusion that none of the Scottish dioceses was in a position to take responsibility for organising such an event and that they could not recommend that such an event should be organised at a national level at this time.

“They went on to agree that it would be appropriate for individuals or parish groups who wished to do so to make a pilgrimage to one of the locations in England.”

Among the hundreds of Scots who made the pilgrimage south was Sister Rosanne Reddy, who also runs the Pro-Life Initiative. “We ended up taking almost 150 people to Lancaster on two buses,” she said. “I am sure had the relics come to Scotland many more people would have been able to go and see them.”