The Feast of Saint Teresa of Avila: the most human mystic, the humanity of Christ, Doctor of prayer, and her own words

Often times the great Saints or mystics can feel very distant from us every day folks leading our very ordinary, daily lives. Well, on October 15th we celebrate one of the four women Doctors of the Church, Saint Teresa of Avila. Saint Teresa of Avila, or properly called Teresa of Jesus, has been called one the most human of the mystics. She relatable to relate to her spiritual daughters and contemporaries, her stories and writings, mystical as they may be, make one laugh with how full of her personality and passions they will find them. There is a well-known story of her carriage getting run amuck and the wheel breaking, and Teresa is said to have exclaimed to Jesus, "if this is how you treat your friends, it's no wonder you have so few!" One minute she was asking the Sisters in the cloister to hold her down if she were to begin levitating (which they obediently did, piling onto her to keep her from floating to the ceiling), and the next she would be dancing on a table with a tambourine telling them to liven up because brides of Christ ought to be filled with life and joy. It was Saint Teresa who famously said, "God save us from gloomy saints!"

She is a Saint of passion, mysticism, heroic courage, zeal, and ardent love for Jesus in His Humanity.

Teresa entered a convent in her 20s and lived there for over 20 years in a kind of complacent spirituality, like some of us might find ourselves today. She fell into the imperfections and faults we often face, gossiping in the parlor with people of high society, spending her time on vanities, and barely praying at all. It wasn't until Jesus began to awaken her spirit to the reality of the life she was living that she began to experience a second conversion. She began experiencing spiritual attack, and as she sought to love Christ more totally and begged Him to heal her of her sins and faults, He began to swell her heart mystically with his Divine Love, setting her heart (literally) ablaze.

She went on to start a reform of the Carmelite order, despite constant adversity and persecution. She founded the Discalced Carmelites, into which she brought Saint John of the Cross, another great mystic, Saint, and Doctor of the Church. Throughout the rest of her life, she founded communities all across Spain, wrote spiritual masterpieces that are still read to this day, and has become a witness of heroic love for Christ. She truly loved His Humanity, and seeing it so often neglected and misunderstood in the midst of many heresies and the Protestant Revolt, she never ceased to emphasize the need to meditate on His humanity every day. She was known for her love of Christ's Passion, and it was often while meditating on this that she received some of the most profound graces and encounters with Him.

If you do not know this beautiful, zestful Saint, I would encourage you to encounter her in her writings. She wrote Interior Castle, The Life (her autobiography), The Way of Perfection, Foundations, and wrote many poems which can be f

found in her Collected Works.

Now, for some of Teresa's own words... Here are just some of her words of wisdom, though I highly, highly recommend actually opening her writings, reading them, letting them sink in, and praying through them yourselves.

QUOTES BY SAINT TERESA OF AVILA

“I would not want any other prayer than that which makes the virtues grow in me. If it should be accompanied by great temptations, dryness and trials leaving me with greater humility, I would consider it a good prayer. That prayer is the best prayer that pleases God the most.”

“Leave it all to God and leave your interests in his hands. He knows what is fitting for us…”

“It seems to me, my daughter, that everything passes so quickly that we should be thinking more about how to die how to live.”

“Let nothing disturb you, let nothing frighten you, all things are passing away: God never changes. Patienceobtains all things. Whoever has God lacks nothing; God alone suffices.”

“Christ has nobody now on earth, but yours, no hands, but yours, no feet but yours, yours are the eyes through which to look out Christ compassion to the world. Yours are the feet with which he is to go about doing good; yours are the hands with which he is to bless men now.”

“Love turns work into rest.”

“The closer one approaches to God, the simpler one becomes.”

“You pay God, a compliment by asking great things of Him.”

“The important thing is not to think much but to love much; and so do that which best stirs you to love.”

“Trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be.”

“ God save us from gloomy Saints!”

“In light of heaven, the worst suffering on earth will be seen to be no more serious than one night in an inconvenient hotel.”

“ God withholds Himself from no one who persevere.”

“To have courage for whatever comes in life— everything lies in that.”

“Reflect carefully on this, for it is so important that I can hardly lay too much stress on it. Fix your eyes on the Crucified and nothing else will be of much important to you.”

“Hope, O my soul, hope. You know neither the day nor the hour. Watch carefully, for everything passes quickly, even though your impatient turns a very short time into a long one.”

“I cannot understand how humility exists, or can exist, without love, or love without humility.”

“Many people are good at talking and bad at understanding.”

“Souls without prayer are like people whose bodies and limbs are paralyzed: they possess feet and hands, but they cannot control them.”

“God‘s will is that no bounds should be set to his works.”

Saint Teresa of Avila, pray for us.