I’ve been reading The Collected Letters of St. Teresa of Avila (Vol. 1, translated by Kieran Kavanaugh, OCD) (Amazon).
I happened to read the Introduction of the book the other day — something I don’t usually do with books. I like to get right to it. I want to read Teresa, not someone writing about Teresa.
But in this case, I was wrong because the Introduction was actually quite compelling and taught me things I never knew about Teresa of Avila.
Writing from his monastery in Washington, DC, the Carmelite Father Kieran Kavanaugh does a great job at situating Teresa in her time and context.
Kavanaugh presents Teresa as an amazing woman, yes; but also as an ordinary person who had to balance community life, prayer, ministry, and the mundane things of life.
The extraordinary gifts of grace bestowed by God on this Spanish Madre fortified her for a demanding ministry of service which entailed heavy responsibilities that drew her contemplative soul into a maelstrom of activities. (page 13)
[Sidebar: That is an amazingly written sentence. "Maelstrom" is a word not often used in everyday parlance. I shall have to incorporate that into my vocabulary. And yes, I had to look it up. It means "a very powerful whirlpool; a large, swirling body of water." A fabulous image.]
Okay, back to the quote. It’s easy sometimes to think of Teresa as tucked away in her monastery cell writing and having ecstatic experiences of God. But she was a contemplative who was very active with ordinary monastery life not to mention writing books and letters and reforming and founding Carmelite monasteries. A monastery just doesn’t appear out of nowhere. Imagine the work that goes into mobilizing people, finding and obtaining a suitable building, caring for the spiritual and physical needs of a group in transition, etc.
Teresa didn’t always succeed at balancing all this stuff. She suffered from lack of sleep and was often sick because she was trying to get so much done and to keep up on her responsibilities. That’s one reason I love Teresa so much — she was just like us in so many ways.
Many of us can well relate to being caught up in “a maelstrom of activities”. How do we handle it all? How do we tend to that contemplative place within each one of us?
Archived Comments
- February 29, 2008 at 9:59 am
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Teresa of Avila is my all time favorite saint. I think it is because she is so real, so strong and so spiritual. I love her writings, especially “Interior Castle”. I may have mentioned this before, but the Spanish government produced a 10-part documentary on her maybe 10-20 years ago. They usually broadcast it on EWTN once a year or so. Anyone interested in seeing it could probably contact them. It really brings her to life.
“Caught up in a maelstrom of activities” – interesting verbage indeed. Yes, I find myself in that situation often. It is a huge challenge to be a committed, spiritual Christian in this world. I refer to it as the Martha-Mary dichotomy. We really need to be able to integrate the salient characteristics of both of those ladies into our lives.
Anyway, how do I tend to the contemplative place within my soul? I retreat to my bedroom, in SILENCE and SOLITUDE, to pray every day. Centering prayer is the mainstay of my prayer life. I often add spiritual reading, the Liturgy of the Hours and/or music meditation. I also have been able to attend a week-long silent, directed retreat every year. God bless my husband. As a married woman with a child, I am grateful I can do all this. I do make my relationship with God a priority though and forgo other activities. It’s well worth it.
- February 29, 2008 at 10:37 am
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The mini series dee mentioned is available on 3 DVD discs through Ignatius Press. For those who love “Big Teresa” and have not seen this program…RUN and get a copy. It is beautifully written, powerfully acted and very historically accurate. Now it is in Spanish with English subtitles, but do NOT let that put you off. Once you get into it, you do not even realize you are reading subtitles. I came away with a greater appreciation of this great woman of faith and what she went through to bring to fruition what God inspired her to do. It is one thing to read that Teresa went here and there, but to see what that meant, the suffering and struggle that that entailed, coupled with the doubt and and seemingly constant battles with Church and secular authorities, it made me wonder if I would have had such courage. VIVA TERESA!!
- February 29, 2008 at 10:57 am
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You two made a believer out of me. I’m going to RUN my mouse over to Amazon right now.
- February 29, 2008 at 2:03 pm
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Meditation helps me a lot to make it through that Maelstrom of activities. I’ve found that I’m far less stressed out, far more centered if I meditate. I also felt that doing a daily examen was very beneficial and helped me to think things trhough and get thigns off my chest. I must make the examen a daily activity, though.
- February 29, 2008 at 2:50 pm
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I can relate to what you said — need to make the daily examen a daily activity. Sometimes everything else in the maelstrom seems ever so much more important.
- March 1, 2008 at 11:00 am
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Yes, but you realize the difference. Nothing is more important than being able to act, not just react to whatever comes along and hits you without a moment’s notice – and to act in accordance with your values. The daily examen keeps me aware that I actually have values to act in accordance with. Or would, if I made it a daily activity. I’m sure that all sounds very insightful but actually I’m just studying Latin with my son and it freaks me out and makes me forget that I am able to keep my unworthy thoughts (such as putting him up for adoption because I can’t stand another crisis because the active gets mixed up with the passive… ) in check. Thanks for your thoughtful and thought-provoking posts, by the way. I always enjoy reading them.
- March 2, 2008 at 12:15 am
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Many of us can well relate to being caught up in “a maelstrom of activities”. How do we handle it all? How do we tend to that contemplative place within each one of us?
I was just thinking about that. The academic world seems to be at odds with the contemplative life sometimes. Other times it crosses over in strange ways. For me, personally, even if I don’t have time for other things, I find if I can at least make time for the Divine Office, things aren’t as chaotic.
- March 2, 2008 at 11:00 am
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Theresa also walked a very fine line with the male hierarchy around her. It was not an easy balancing act being female and feeling the push to contradict what she was being told.
Well, for me… Cyclone was easier to spell… LOL… not really. But that is not how I am all the time. I have to have my non-chaotic time to ‘gather my resources’ and tune in to the Infinite. But I really think that, for me, just knowing there is a Purpose to everything. I might not be able to see it now, but there is in the Grand Scheme of Things a solid reason why ‘this’ needed to happen ‘now’. The Universe is not Vindictive. This relates to both the comment about the naughtiness of worrying at night as well as Sailing with my Center.
