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Preface

Saint Teresa of Avila

By Michael R. Heinlein

Saint Teresa of Avila’s greatness is manifested in a host of ways. But it is perhaps her recognition as a Doctor of the Church that encapsulates them all. Designated with the honor in 1970 by Pope Paul VI, Teresa became the first woman held up to the Church as an exemplary theologian and a master teacher of the Faith.

She has been referred to as the doctor orationis — the doctor of prayer — because the majority of her writings are poetic expositions on prayer. In her autobiography, she describes prayer as “nothing else than an intimate sharing between friends; it means taking time frequently to be alone with Him who we know loves us.”

While we can learn much from her writings about how to grow in holiness, we can also learn much from her own life. All her life she aspired to greatness, and this greatness is something we should aspire to as well.

From a young age, she wanted a life of adventure. As a child of about four, inspired after reading the tales of heroes of the Faith, she set out with her brother to achieve sainthood by becoming a martyr at the hands of the Moors. Fortunately, her plans amounted to little after their uncle stopped them not far from their home. Many of us today can identify with this scene, because it reminds us that our plans are always inferior to God’s.

As a young adult, Teresa sought greatness in ways that many a young woman of means might. She was taken up with the things of this world. She hung around with worldly friends and enjoyed those social occasions in which she could show off her fine clothes. She had a penchant for jewelry and perfume.

For her schooling, Teresa was sent to a local academy for young women of affluent families. Given the choice between religious life and marriage — the only two options for women of her time — she had negative feelings about both. There was a restlessness deep within her, as the greatness she desired could not be found in the worldly ways she knew. After a lengthy battle with serious illness and great mental anguish, she decided to enter the local Carmelite convent in Avila. There, Teresa was still ambivalent about religious life, but it seems she tried it in desperation to find the peace for which she longed. In religious life she would slowly come to encounter the Lord and find in him the peace she desired. Ultimately, her life teaches us that our truest peace will only ever be found in God alone.

Like many saints, Teresa seemed to hit rock bottom spiritually before she began the path to true greatness for which she was longing in the depths of her soul. Eventually she found that the Carmelite convent she entered was not conducive to the life of prayer she truly desired. While the nuns kept the outer practices familiar to convents at her time — like fasting, communal recitation of the office, regular confession, etc. — her convent relaxed many of their rules. Several of its well-to-do nuns did not have to give up much of their wealthy means. They were even entitled to their own apartments, complete with a small chapel, kitchen, and guest quarters.

Teresa was not satisfied with the laxity of her initial years in religious life. She suffered again from fits of ill health. Convalescing, she decided to take the advice of a friend and commit more firmly to mental prayer. But she quickly talked herself out of it, and she continued to suffer the consequences.

Eventually, in what she would later describe as a second conversion, Teresa came to know God’s intimate presence in her life. As she persevered in prayer, she developed a greater awareness of God’s presence and of her distance from him on account of her own sinfulness. Over time her prayer deepened, and she enjoyed mystical experiences of interior voices and visions, as well as ecstatic moments at the height of contemplative prayer.

The divine intimacy that she found was what she had been longing for and unable to find. Here at last was the true greatness she had been seeking so restlessly throughout her life. Teresa teaches us that prayer is the necessary means to achieving the unity with God for which we have been created. Moreover, through her we learn that we can only find the meaning of life, and the greatness we seek, in God alone.

Teresa’s life also teaches us that we must be people of action. She knew that the quality of religious life she experienced in her first years as a nun was not what it should be — and she was not alone. This was the age of the Reformation, and many of the problems among religious and the clergy were coming to a head across Europe. Many reformers of religious communities recognized that religious life needed to be refashioned. It was necessary to retrieve the way of life intended by the various founders of those religious orders.

So Teresa set out to bring reform to the Carmelites in Spain — no small task for a woman of her time. It required a great deal of bravery. Ironically, despite many other reform movements within religious communities throughout Europe (which were mostly well received by superiors and the Church hierarchy), Teresa’s attempts at reform were looked upon with suspicion. Her reforms attracted criticism from her monastery in Avila, as the nuns felt their way of life threatened. Many doubted the fruits of her contemplative visions — Spain during her time was home to a number of female “visionaries” who turned out to be frauds — but Teresa did not back down.

Eventually, after her death, a distinct status for Teresa’s Carmelite observance was formed, known as the Discalced (or shoeless) Carmelites, indicative of their strict observance of the ancient Carmelite rule. Overall, Teresa founded nearly twenty convents in as many years. And there were additional religious houses for men, sometimes opened in collaboration with another Spanish Carmelite mystic and reformer, Saint John of the Cross.

As if her contemplative life combined with her strenuous work to establish reformed Carmelite houses throughout Spain was not enough, Teresa also authored a number of spiritual works. Through her writings and in her own conduct, Teresa teaches us that true greatness consists in allowing the qualities of Christ to live in us.

Deeply humble, Teresa only desired what God willed, and at times she had to be convinced to share her spiritual insights through writing. Asked once to write something on prayer, she replied: “For the love of God let me work at my spinning wheel and go to choir and perform the duties of the religious life, like the other sisters. I am not meant to write. I have neither health nor intelligence for it.”

At last Teresa did write that work on prayer, and it became known throughout the centuries as one of the greatest spiritual treatises on the topic. The work was the Interior Castle, a book that allows us to learn from Teresa’s own experience of prayer and the stages of the spiritual life. She teaches us how to obtain the divine union for which we have all been made, and for which we all long, even if we do not always realize it.

Teresa of Avila died in 1582 and was canonized in 1622, on the same day as Saints Ignatius Loyola, Francis Xavier, and Philip Neri. Her cult spread quickly, with many desiring her to be named a patron of Spain, and numerous miracles were attributed to her intercession. Her feast was spread to the universal Church in 1688, and she was the first female non-martyr saint to be so honored.

Saint Teresa of Avila’s teachings have survived the ages, in part because of their multifaceted appeal and universal approachability. Pope Paul VI described her writings as making known “a mother of wonderful simplicity and yet a teacher of remarkable depth.”