Father,
by your Spirit you raised up St Teresa of Jesus
to show your Church the way of perfection.
May her inspired teaching
awaken in us a longing for true holiness.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.
Feast Day is October 15
Virgin and doctor of the church
Born to a wealthy family in Spain and a father pious and strict bordering on the extreme, he decided to send her at the age of 16 to the local Carmelite convent. He felt she was out of control because of being boy crazy, her love of clothes and extremely rebellious nature. When age dictated marriage or a religious life, Teresa chose the life of a nun and was installed at the Carmelite convent permanently. She began to learn and practice mental prayer and her theological beliefs toward inter peace became manifest. The convent encouraged her to have visitors to whom she would teach the mental prayer concept. Teresa fell ill with malaria and suffered a seizure. After four days, she awakened from the coma to discover a grave had been dug for her. Paralyzed for years and never completely well Teresa soon attracted many companions which led to opening up of her own convent. She wrote books which are renowned for their depth of doctrine and which showed her own spiritual experience. (hence her title: “Doctor of the Church) Teresa also helped to reform the friars, who labeled her as a trouble maker. At 51, she felt it was time to spread her reform movement. She was called a disobedient gadabout by the papal nuncio. The Carmelite order excommunicated her along with the members of her convent. She was denounced to the inquisition. Soon she had postulants clamoring to get into her reform convents. Many people thought about what said and wanted to learn about prayer from her. Soon her ideas about prayer swept not only through Spain but all of Europe. At the age of 61 on October 4th, 1582 she died. She is the founder of the Discalced Carmelites and is interred at the Motherhouse. St. Teresa de Jesus was canonized in 1622. She is the patron saint of headache sufferers. Her symbol is a heart, an arrow and a book. In 1970 she was declared a Doctor of the Church for her writing and teaching on prayer, one of two women to be honored in this way. Mother Teresa assumed her name upon becoming a nun with a vow to imitate her namesake.
Saint of the Day, Lives, Lessons and Feast, By Leonard Foley, O.F.M.; revised by Pat McCloskey, O.F.M.