TERESA OF ÁVILA: MYSTIC AND FIERCE, FAITHFUL REFORMER
Saint for all seasons — and synodsusers to support our news reporting.
If St. Teresa of Ávila, the 16th century nun, could time-travel to this era, when Pachamama idols are worshipped in Vatican gardens and silver coins are issued in her honor, she would not be a happy person. "Life is like a night in a bad inn," she is to have once said, and she would find many things about the state of Church affairs bad indeed.
Teresa was a great protector of the Catholic faith — as a child desiring death by martyrdom — and was deeply upset by the "Lutherans," a term she liberally used to describe all those breaking from the Faith. She thought the Devil was snagging them away to Hell and was worried about their souls. She wanted to rescue them through penance until she could find more effective measures.
Cardinal Reinhard Marx and the left-leaning German synod–bishops might find their current plans lambasted by this faithful, tireless nun who reformed the Carmelite order, wanting to do all she could for Christ's Church on earth knowing there would be time to rest in Heaven — although she is said to have desired doing God's work in the hereafter as well.
It is interesting — even entertaining — to imagine what she might say to the intellectual hefties of the German Church who are now making mass change to the "face of the Church."
She might well suggest that they start reforming the Church by reforming themselves — doing penance and donning discalced sandals as a good way to start.
But St. Teresa has not time-traveled to Rome, and the progressive bishops and their U.N. associates would likely describe her take on matters as "out of touch" — as they have even described Jesus.
Or they might argue — were she to be dropped into their world — she would no doubt see things as they do, appropriating her as they have St. Francis of Assisi.
Or they might simply shun her as a "dragon traditionalist" whose life represents a backward and irrelevant past.
But to ignore Teresa would be to ignore the mind-boggling contributions she left behind.
Search for Truth in Christ
Born of a converso family in 16th-century Spain, Teresa was in her teens when she left her home — to the consternation of her father — to join the Carmelites in Ávila.
She discovered a convent of ease and even luxury, as was often the case in those days. The convents often served as places where well-to-do women who did not marry came to live, replete with their riches and servants.
Teresa herself was, at first, part of this station. But it is said that a statue of our suffering Lord — which exists to this day in Ávila — gave her deep spiritual pause and caused her to ask: "Who is this Man? And why is He suffering?"
The asking and the answering of this question were to lead to Teresa's mystical prayer experiences, to her writing masterpieces of Catholic and Spanish literature and to the successful and long-lasting reformation of 17 Carmelite convents throughout Spain.
Definitive 'How-To' on Prayer
A look at Bernini's famous sculpture in the Cornaro Chapel of the church of Santa Maria della Vittoria in Rome does much to describe the quality and timber of Teresa's prayer life. It appears that what Teresa described in her biography about union with God, Bernini dramatized in marble.
Teresa wrote that she saw in an angel's hand:
a long spear of gold, and at the point there seemed to be a little fire. He appeared to me to be thrusting it at times into my heart, and to pierce my very entrails; when he drew it out, he seemed to draw them out also, and to leave me all on fire with a great love of God. The pain was so great, that it made me moan; and yet so surpassing was the sweetness of this excessive pain, that I could not wish to be rid of it ... .
Considered Spain's most eloquent writer next to Cervantes, Teresa wrote Las Moradas (The Mansions), which represents as thorough a treatise on how to pray — starting with rote prayer to union with God — as anything any Church Father has yet written. It was inspired by her vision of the soul as a diamond in the shape of a castle containing seven mansions, which she interpreted as the journey of faith through seven stages, culminating in union with God. It remains the epic "go-to" guide on how to pray.
The diminutive nun also gave her Carmelite sisters The Way of Perfection, calling it a "living book," in which she taught her daughter nuns how to progress through prayer. In it, she gave an explication of the Our Father that helps "perfecters" of prayer life to this day. As Teresa said: "As we repeat the Our Father so many times ... let us delight in it."
Dogged Reformer
Teresa's prayer life was not overshadowed by her effective administrative skills, which sought to purify Church structures — something today's Vatican planners might well emulate.
Taking on the laxity and decadence of her order, when she was 47 years old she founded her first reformed convent named for St. Joseph, for whom she had a life-long devotion.
Teresa went on to found and reform 16 more convents throughout Spain, all against the backdrop of the Protestant revolt sweeping Europe and the Spanish Inquisition.
Teresa eschewed the titles aristocratic women brought with them to the convent, choosing to be called Teresa of Jesus and urging her sisters to follow suit.
Legacy of Influence
Not often discussed is that Teresa is responsible for a lineage of modern Catholic holy women and saints of great influence.
Saint Thérèse of Lisieux (1875–1898), the French Carmelite, was named for Teresa, and took as her religious name Sister Thérèse of the Child Jesus.
St. Thérèse, Edith Stein, Dorothy Day and Mother Teresa
Edith Stein (1891–1942) is said to have converted from atheism after reading Teresa's biography and eventually took the name of Sr. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross. Stein said, "When I had finished the book, I said to myself: 'This is the truth.'"
Dorothy Day (1891–1980) narrates in her autobiography The Long Loneliness that after Teresa's biography fell into her hands, her life direction changed course. Day also named her daughter Tamar Terese in honor of the 16th-century saint.
And, of course, Mother Teresa of Calcutta's name is a nod to all of her above Teresian namesakes.
Multidimensional Mystic
Teresa is also known for her down-to-earth sense of humor. One often-quoted quip is embedded in Teresa making her way to a convent in the middle of a rainstorm. She slipped down an embankment and fell into the mud. She looked to Heaven and said to her Maker, "If this is how You treat Your friends, no wonder You have so few of them!"
So fully dimensional is the person of Teresa of Jesus — nun, reformer, sister, Mother, writer, mystic, friend to John of the Cross and administrator — her feast day is not easily documented in words.
A prayer attributed to St. Teresa, which soothing words are known for instilling peace in those who pray them, may serve as a more suitable ending:
Continued
https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/st-teresa-of-avila
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