Saint Teresa of Ávila, Virgin and Doctor – Readings

Commentary on Romans 8:22-27; John 15:1-8

In the First Reading from the Letter to the Romans, Paul reflects on his mystical experience of knowing Christ. They parallel the experiences that Teresa also had:

…we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies.

Like Paul, she wanted to be in the image of God’s incarnate Son. At the same time, her experience is one of longing for something that has not yet been fully realised. It is a time for faith and trust and for hope. As Paul says:

For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope, for who hopes for what one already sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

Ultimately, our salvation is one of hope, but it is hope based on confidence in the reliability of God’s Word. And when we are feeling less confident, then it is:

…the Spirit helps us in our weakness, for we do not know how to pray as we ought…

And Paul makes the striking statement:

…that very Spirit intercedes with groanings too deep for words.

Teresa knew all about this. Her attachment to Jesus knew no limits, but like many of the greatest mystics, she had her times of desert—what her companion John of the Cross called the “dark night of the soul”. If even the saints had this experience, we cannot expect anything different. But we need to realise, as they did, that when Jesus seems furthest away is often the time when he is closest to us. This is the time of our testing. As Teresa liked to say:

“It is love alone that gives worth to all things.”

The Gospel reading is from Jesus’ discourse at the Last Supper which we find in John. It is from chapter 15 where Jesus speaks of himself as the “True Vine”. While he himself is the Vine, it is his Father who is the Vine Grower. Jesus’ followers are the branches on the vine. Branches which produce no fruit will be cut off and while branches which do bear fruit will be pruned in order to increase their yield.

It is clear that, if we are to remain united with Christ, we must lead fruitful lives. Others are to benefit from the way we lead our Christian life. Elsewhere Jesus had told his disciples that they were to be “the salt of the earth”, to be:

…the light of the world. A city built on a hill…a lamp [that] gives light to all in the house. (Matt 5:14)

Again, he had said it was no use accepting God’s gifts and then carefully burying them in the ground. They are to be used for the benefit of other people.

But even in the case of those who are ‘fruitful’, there will always be need of some ‘pruning’. Some form of penance and self-denial is a central part of the fruitful Christian’s life. This penance may be self-chosen or it may come in the course of our daily lives. These are not meant to punish us, but rather to purify our intentions and make us more effective in spreading the spirit of the Gospel among other people.

Jesus also emphasises in this image, the importance of our being totally united with him. That means we accept entirely his Way of life and try to make it our own. Only then will we have something to share with others:

Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me.

We need to realise that:

Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.

On the contrary:

If you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.

And the reason is, when we live in Christ, his will and our will coincide.

Finally, it is by leading truly fruitful lives that we will give glory to God. Words of adoration alone will not be enough.

We see all this fitting so well into the life of Teresa. Her whole life was to be deeply united with her Lord. She was indeed a living branch on the vine. She experienced pruning in the many challenges and difficulties she met in reforming the Carmelite Order, not to mention the life of penance and austerity which were a feature of her convents.

But she was fruitful also in the influence she had on drawing others into living their lives at such a high level of commitment. This was shown by the large number of convents which were founded in her own country and eventually all over the world.

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Saint Teresa of Ávila, Virgin and Doctor

Teresa was born on 28 March, 1515, of a noble Castilian family at Ávila, in central Spain. As a child, Teresa showed piety beyond her years. On one occasion she ran away from home with a younger brother with the intention of going to Morocco and dying as martyrs. Their uncle spoiled their plan when he spotted the two children outside the city walls.

Following the custom of her social class, she was educated at home up to the death of her mother, which happened when Teresa was just 14. She then developed the usual teenage interests of romantic affairs and fashionable clothes. Her father then sent her to be educated by Augustinian Sisters in Ávila. About 18 months later, she became ill and spent her convalescence reading the letters of St Jerome. This resulted in her desire to become a nun. Her father was at first opposed to the idea, but then consented and Teresa, then 20, entered the Carmelite convent of the Incarnation in Ávila.

However, she soon became ill again from malaria. She was sent home to her family for medical treatment, but three years later, returned to the convent.

At this time the convent had a large community of about 140 nuns and had become somewhat lax in its following of the Carmelite rule. The convent parlour was often visited by the gentry of the town, and the nuns were even allowed to leave the enclosure of the convent. In this rather easygoing atmosphere, with not much time given to solitude or the observance of religious poverty, Teresa at first tried to live a life of prayer, then abandoned it. But following her father’s death, she took it up again for the rest of her life. Teresa’s charm, cheerfulness, prudence and care for others were greatly admired, not least by those who came to visit the convent. Her own spiritual life was deepened by her prayer life. In 1555, she experienced an inner conversion when she identified herself with two famous penitents, Mary Magdalene and Augustine. The latter’s Confessions had a deep influence on her. She had both Dominicans and Jesuits as spiritual directors.

On the feast of St Peter in 1559, Teresa became firmly convinced that Christ was present to her in bodily form, though invisible. This vision lasted almost uninterrupted for more than two years. In another vision, an angel drove the point of a golden arrow repeatedly through her heart, causing an indescribable happiness and pain. (This is dramatically represented in the famous sculpture by Bernini—The Ecstasy of St Teresa in Santa Maria della Vittoria in Rome.) The memory of this experience would inspire her for the rest of her life, and was the motivation behind her lifelong desire to identify with the sufferings of Jesus, expressed in her prayer: “Lord, either let me suffer or let me die.”

Unfortunately her mystical experiences, including visions, became known and she was subjected to ridicule and even persecution. It was a time when such experiences subjected one to the investigations of the Inquisition—St Ignatius Loyola would have similar experiences. However, up to the year 1560 she received support and encouragement from Peter of Alcántara.

After 25 years of Carmelite life, which she felt was not living up to the ideals of the Order, she desired to set up a community where the original rule would be strictly observed. Her proposal met with strong opposition from both church and civil authorities. But she went ahead and set up the community of St Joseph in Ávila in 1562. Here 13 nuns lived in conditions of strict poverty and enclosed solitude. On moving to the new convent, Teresa got papal approval of her commitment to absolute poverty and renunciation of all property. Her plan was a revival of earlier, stricter rules. These were supplemented by new regulations such as the use of the ‘discipline’ (a small whip) to be used three times a week, and ‘discalceation’ of the Sisters, that is, the substitution of leather or wooden sandals for shoes. For the first five years of the new foundation, Teresa remained in prayerful seclusion, engaged mostly in writing.

The Ávila convent would be the first of 16 similar convents set up during Teresa’s lifetime. It would also inspire the setting up of other reformed communities in other countries and in the generations that followed. The characteristics of this life were material simplicity, signified by the coarse brown wool habit and leather sandals. The lifestyle of manual work, supplemented by alms, provided the income for this way of life, which included a diet that totally excluded meat. Teresa, though the superior, took her turn at sweeping, spinning and other household chores. The convents were small and poor yet built in such a way that the personal needs of the community could be met.

Teresa was no mere idealist, but a very down to earth person. Her combination of common sense, prudence and trust in God’s Providence, together with a great capacity for work and organisation, overcame the many obstacles she had to face. In choosing candidates for this challenging way of life, she emphasised intelligence and good judgement (she once declared: “God preserve us from stupid nuns!”). It was her conviction that intelligent people can better be aware of their faults and, at the same time, see the need to be guided. This, she felt, would not be the case with the less-able and narrow-minded who could become complacent and see no need for change.

During the late 1560s, Teresa was also active in the reform of the Carmelite friars in association with John of the Cross. This reform, as in the case of her own convents, met with much opposition from the Calced (unreformed) Carmelites. Eventually the reformed (or Discalced) Carmelites were recognised as a separate structure from the unreformed. In Teresa’s lifetime and later, the Discalced friars would prove invaluable as spiritual directors of the Sisters.

In her teaching on prayer, Teresa’s work would be complemented by the more theological approach of John of the Cross. Her own writings, though in a more colloquial style and written under obedience, emphasise various kinds of prayer which can endure over a long period, but can be the stepping stones to true mystical prayer. Her books include her own life story, Libro de las Fundaciones (the story of her Foundations), The Way of Perfection (written for nuns) and The Interior Castle.

In 1582, she founded her last convent at Burgos, but died on her way back to Ávila at Alba de Tormes on 4 October of that year—she was 67 years old. Her body was buried and still rests there.

Forty years after her death, in 1622, she was canonised and she is revered as the ‘Seraphic Virgin’. The Spanish Cortes Generales made her patroness of Spain in 1617, and the University of Salamanca had earlier conferred the title ‘Doctor ecclesiae‘ (Doctor of the Church) to be distinguished from the Holy See’s ‘Doctor of the Church’ given in 1970, the first woman to be so honoured. The mysticism in her works exerted an influence on many theologians of the following centuries, such as Francis de Sales, Fénelon, and the Port-Royalists.

A contemporary portrait, painted in 1570 by Fray Juan de la Miseria, survives at Ávila. Her usual emblems are a fiery arrow or a dove above her head.

The ideals and way of life established by her survive in the numerous small communities of Carmelite Sisters, who witness to the importance of contemplation in our modern world. Her written works are spiritual classics read by Christians of all kinds.

Although she died on 4 October, her feast is on 15 October because in 1582, on the very day after her death, the Gregorian reform of the calendar was adopted, and ten days were permanently omitted from the month of October.

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