From: hildegard8@excite.com   
      
   October 15th - Saint Teresa of Avila   
   Virgin, Reformer of the Carmelite Order (1515-1582)   
      
   "By their fruits you will know them," says Our Lord of those who claim to be   
   His   
   followers. The fruits which remain of the life, labors and prayer of Saint   
   Teresa of Avila bear to her virtue a living and enduring testimony which   
   none   
   can refuse to admit. She herself wrote her life and many other celebrated   
   spiritual works, and much more can still be said of this soul of   
   predilection,   
   whose writings and examples have led so many souls to high sanctity.   
      
   Born in 1515 in the kingdom of Castile in Spain, she was the youngest child   
   of a   
   virtuous nobleman. When she was seven years old, Teresa fled from her home   
   with   
   one of her young brothers, in the hope of going to Africa and receiving the   
   palm   
   of martyrdom. Brought back and asked the reason for her flight, she replied:   
   "I   
   want to see God, and I must die before I can see Him." She then began, with   
   her   
   same brother, Rodriguez, to build a hermitage in the garden, and was often   
   heard   
   repeating: "Forever, forever!" She lost her mother at the age of twelve   
   years,   
   and was led by worldly companions into various frivolities. Her father   
   decided   
   to place her in a boarding convent, and she obeyed without any inclination   
   for   
   this kind of life. Grace came to her assistance with the good guidance of   
   the   
   Sisters, and she decided to enter religion in the Carmelite monastery of the   
   Incarnation at Avila.   
      
   For a time frivolous conversations there, too, checked her progress toward   
   perfection, but finally in her thirty-first year, she abandoned herself   
   entirely   
   to God. A vision showed her the very place in hell to which her apparently   
   light   
   faults would have led her, and she was told by Our Lord that all her   
   conversation must be with heaven. Ever afterwards she lived in the deepest   
   distrust of herself. When she was named Prioress against her will at the   
   monastery of the Incarnation, she succeeded in conciliating even the most   
   hostile hearts by placing a statue of Our Lady in the seat she would   
   ordinarily   
   have occupied, to preside over the Community.   
      
   God enlightened her to understand that He desired the reform of her Order,   
   and   
   her heart was pierced with divine love. The Superior General gave her full   
   permission to found as many houses as might become feasible. She dreaded   
   nothing   
   so much as delusion in the decisions she would make in difficult situations;   
   we   
   can well understand this, knowing she founded seventeen convents for the   
   Sisters, and that fifteen others for the Fathers of the Reform were   
   established   
   during her lifetime, with the aid of Saint John of the Cross. To the end of   
   her   
   life she acted only under obedience to her confessors, and this practice   
   both   
   made her strong and preserved her from error. Journeying in those days was   
   far   
   from comfortable and even perilous, but nothing could stop the Saint from   
   accomplishing the holy Will of God. When the cart was overturned one day and   
   she   
   had a broken leg, her sense of humor became very evident by her remark:   
   "Dear   
   Lord, if this is how You treat Your friends, it is no wonder You have so   
   few!"   
   She died October 4, 1582, and was canonized in 1622.   
      
   The history of her mortal remains is as extraordinary as that of her life.   
   After   
   nine months in a wooden coffin, caved in from the excess weight above it,   
   the   
   body was perfectly conserved, though the clothing had rotted. A fine perfume   
   it   
   exuded spread throughout the entire monastery of the nuns, when they   
   reclothed   
   it. Parts of it were later removed as relics, including the heart showing   
   the   
   marks of the Transverberation, and her left arm. At the last exhumation in   
   1914,   
   the body was found to remain in the same condition as when it was seen   
   previously, still recognizable and very fragrant with the same intense   
   perfume.   
      
   Reflection: The devotion of Saint Teresa of Avila to Saint Joseph, virginal   
   father of Jesus, is proverbial. She said she had never asked anything of him   
   without receiving what she requested. In the eighteenth century the   
   Carmelite   
   churches named for him numbered over one hundred and fifty. Let us imitate   
   this   
   holy Foundress and invoke Saint Joseph for our needs, both spiritual and   
   temporal.   
      
   Sources: Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des Saints, by Msgr. Paul Guérin   
   (Bloud   
   et Barral: Paris, 1882), Vol. 12; Little Pictorial Lives of the Saints, a   
   compilation based on Butler's Lives of the Saints and other sources by John   
   Gilmary Shea (Benziger Brothers: New York, 1894).   
      
      
   Quote   
   Resist your impatience faithfully, practicing, not only with reason, but   
   even   
   against reason, holy courtesy and sweetness to all, but especially to those   
   who   
   weary you the most.   
   --St. Francis de Sales   
      
   Bible Quote   
   14 Now when the apostles, who were in Jerusalem, had heard that Samaria had   
   received the word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John. 15 Who, when   
   they   
   were come, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Ghost. 16 For   
   he   
   was not as yet come upon any of them; but they were only baptized in the   
   name of   
   the Lord Jesus. 17 Then they laid their hands upon them, and they received   
   the   
   Holy Ghost.  (Acts 8:14-17)   
      
      
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   Prayer   
      
   O God, who by thy Holy Spirit didst move Teresa of Avila to   
   manifest to thy Church the way of perfection: Grant us, we   
   beseech thee, to be nourished by her excellent teaching, and   
   enkindle within us a lively and unquenchable longing for true   
   holiness; through Jesus Christ, the joy of loving hearts, who with   
   thee and the same Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, for   
   ever and ever.   
      
   Almighty God, who, when the hearts of Thy people have waxen   
   cold, dost send Thy Spirit to rekindle the flame of Thy love in their   
   hearts, and dost raise up faithful ministers to recall Thy people to   
   their former devotion and service. Mercifully grant that we,   
   following the teaching and example of Teresa of Avila and   
   others, may be filled with Thy Holy Spirit, may be aflame with zeal   
   for thy glory and love for Thy goodness and hunger for thy love,   
   and that our feet may be set upon the path that leads to true   
   holiness; that which we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord, who   
   liveth and reigneth with thee and the same Holy Spirit, one God,   
   now and ever.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)