teresa of avila

When I professed final vows, I did not expect to feel any different than I had because I’d been with the community for approximately 10 years already.

Teresa spent a year and a half living with the nuns. Still, she resisted becoming a nun, saying, “I could not be persuaded to be one” (Life 3.2). Though obviously attracted to the life, Teresa needed time to adjust to the possibility of God calling her to religious life. Like Teresa we are often given the same challenge of imagining our life in a different way.

This is the second in a series of three posts on Saint Teresa of Avila. The whole piece was originally published in VISION, the Catholic Religious Discernment Guide.

Teresa was in the convent school with the Augustinian Nuns (see previous post) for about a year and a half. She says that although she grew closer to God, “I still had no desire to be a nun, and I asked God not to give me this vocation” (Life 3.2).