Teresa of Avila

Grace and peace to you from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Intro to the Saints

While you likely are quite aware that the Catholic Church has a strong tradition of honoring particular Saints, you might not know that we actually commemorate saints in our own tradition. Saints in our tradition are not the same as Saints in the Catholic Tradition. You and I, as baptized believers, are saints already. When we fulfill our baptismal journey, we will live as saints in the Kingdom of God. But all of us are saints… not just a few. But there are a few among the saints that we commemorate each year.

We don’t pray to them. We don’t look for miracles to be worked in their names. But we commemorate them because through their lives the work of Christ was somehow made uniquely visible. Among the saints that we commemorate are people like Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Theresa, Julian of Norwich, and (most recently added) the Charleston Nine who showed incredible love and welcomed one Dylan Roof… one who did not come in the name of peace.

There are many other such saints. Nearly every week we have a day of commemoration for one or two such saints. If you’re really interested, let Pastor Peter know and he can direct you to some additional resources if you’d like to learn more.

So, why all this talk about saints? Well, first starters it’s a little known tradition with the church but one that offers great inspiration for our own lives. And secondly… you might have guessed it… we’re going to talk about one of those commemorated saints today.

Saint Teresa of Avila

This Friday, on October 15th, the church commemorates a saint of the church. Hername was Teresa of Avila. Now, this is not Saint Teresa of Calcutta from the 20thcentury who likely comes to our minds. Teresa of Avila was a woman born not into the 20th century, but the 16th century; the year was 1515, to be precise.

To help give some perspective of what was going on in the world in her lifetime, Martin Luther would have been in his early 40s when she was born. Two years after Teresa was born, Martin Luther was nailing the 95 Theses to the castle church doors of Wittenberg. Europe was enflamed with religious intrigue as the Reformation upended the church as they knew it. People were asking deep questions of faith as they sought to understand what it was to be a follower of Christ. It was a transformative time for the church… much as the church today is going through a transformative time as we once again as we see very different understandings in our world of what it looks like to be a disciple of Christ.

Teresa of Avila was born in a curious time in the church. But she was also born into a curious family. Her grandfather had been a Jew living in Spain. As the Spanish Inquisition burned through the land, Teresa’s grandfather had been forced to either convert to Christianity or be exiled from his home. He chose to make the conversion, at least in name. Later in his life, he returned to Judaism only to be threatened once more by the Spanish Inquisition and forced again to convert to Christianity.

The family was wealthy, though. Teresa’s father was a very successful merchant. So successful, in fact, that he was able to purchase a title of knighthood from the Crown. They also were able to afford something unusual for Teresa… an education. Teresa became enamored with reading… especially popular fiction stories of the time. She also loved hearing the stories of the great battles between the Spanish Knights and the Moorish invaders. She loved hearing them so much that at the age of 7 she ran off with her brother in hopes of dying in battle and thus achieving martyrdom in a hopeless plight against the invaders. Her uncle caught them at the city wall and brought them back home.

But then, during a childhood that many of the era could only dream of, tragedy struck. Teresa’s mother became sick and she died; leaving the 11-year-old girl with a father who was too busy to care for her but enough wealth to send her to be cared for by the local nuns. She fell in love with the teachings of Christ and the history of the church all the more during this time. The stories of the saints became less mythical and more inspirational for Teresa as she grew up in the convent.

Until, one day, much to her father’s horror, she cast off all her possessions and titles in order to fully walk in the path she felt Christ was calling her to.

She did the very thing that the rich man in our gospel lesson struggled with… she let go of her MANY possessions to see what life had to offer without them. In the face of grief from the loss of her mother, in the face of her persistent health issues, she recognized that true comfort and hope came to her not through the knick-knacks she could purchase for herself but through a life dedicated to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Teresa, in her devotion toward God, became a prolific writer of the church. Like Martin Luther, however, her teachings were not always well received by those in power. One papal legate described her as a "restless wanderer, disobedient, and stubborn femina who, under the title of devotion, invented bad doctrines, moving outside the cloister against the rules of the Council of Trent and her prelates; teaching as a master against Saint Paul's orders that women should not teach."

But when Teresa joined the convent she let go not only of her wealth and nobility, she also began the process of letting go of being controlled by tradition. She broke with her own father’s wishes when she took the vows to become a nun. She was willing to do and to say what she believed Christ was calling on her to do and to write even when society and the authorities around her tried to her push her in a different direction.

Ultimately, the persistence of her discipleship to Christ won out. The nuns of her order began to listen to her. Soon, others even beyond the doors of the abbey listened as well. She became a respected voice of the church to help the church in its own walk of discipleship. In fact, her writings are still being reprinted to this very day. She was canonized as a Saint of the Catholic Church in 1622 by Pope Gregory XV (the fifteenth) and in 1970 the very first female Doctor of the Church by Pope Paul VI (the sixth).

Connections to the Gospel

St. Teresa of Avila’s life is a powerful illustration of what Jesus is calling us to do through our gospel lesson today. No, I don’t believe Jesus is calling each and every one of us to sell everything, join a convent, and become named one of the 36 Doctors of the Catholic Church hundreds of years after your death. But Jesus does call us out of our places of comfort that we might boldly and even recklessly follow where Christ is leading us.

We so often get hung up on the specifics of the rich man in our lesson today. We get hung up on the idea of what life would be like if we sell all of our possessions. But Christ’s encouragement was specific to him. For Teresa of Avila, Christ called for her to not only leave her wealth behind but to step out of the traditional role of a woman in the 16th century and proclaim a bold word to the whole of the church!

Because, ultimately, we’re not trying to punch our tickets to get to heaven… Christ already did that on the cross. For us, it is impossible to punch our own ticket. Any ticket we could come up with to get through the pearly gates would just be a bad forgery.

What we are called to do in this life is not to prove ourselves to God but to hear what work Christ has for us as his disciples while we still have breath within us. What difference will our moments make to the people around us and the people who come after us? When we are dead and gone, what will it matter that we lived at all? And I’m not saying what do you need to do to be remembered… Hitler will be remembered for hundreds of years. I’m asking, what difference will your life have meant after you’re gone? What are the little things, the little acts of kindness, the moments of love and care that will trickle down throughout the ages?

How will you leaving your place of comfort help CREATE a place of comfort for someone else? And, perhaps most importantly for you to consider today, what will you leaving your place of comfort look like?

A pastor in our synod shared that after she preached on this text several years in Pennsylvania, an elderly gentleman who she knew was quite well off came up to her and said, “You know, I don’t think Jesus is telling me to sell everything that I have and give it to the poor. But, I do think he’s telling me to do something. I do think Jesus wants me to be more intentional in how I live for others, so here’s this…” and he handed her an envelope with a check inside.

Within the envelope was a check addressed to the church for $10,000. The pastor was amazed to think of what might the church could do with this amazing, unexpected gift. And as the council began considering how they might put that gift to good use, another check for $10,000 came in the next month… and the next… and the next. He still does it to this day… and when people ask him about it he says that when he dies it is all going to the church anyway, so why not put some of that money into action today?

What’s important for us to consider about this story is not the size of the gift, though the size certainly gets us to pay attention. Rather, it is helpful to recognize that this man heard a call within his discipleship walk to be more intentional… and he followed it. He entered into the Kingdom of God in the hear and now because he was actively trying to follow Christ’s call in the hear and now.

His ticket to heaven was already punched… and he didn’t get any additional “class upgrades” for the flight to heaven because he followed that call. But he does get to experience the joy of living into the Kingdom of God not just in the next life but in this life.

Conclusion

How do we walk in the Kingdom of God in this life? We step out of our places of comfort and we follow where Christ calls us. We step out of unhelpful, restraining traditions. We step out of the roles that others have told us we should stay in. We step out of the false promises of things that we hold onto for security in this world… and we follow Christ.

And remember that the path that Christ calls us to is not always what we expect it will be. As a child, Teresa of Avila thought that following Christ meant going on a crusade against the Moorish invaders. She hoped to die a glorious death that she thought would prove herself to God. But God was not calling her to that. God was calling her to teach, to mentor, to write… to love.

May your ears be opened to where and how Christ is calling you. May you feel the nudging of the Holy Spirit. May you be inspired to step out and into the life offered in the Kingdom of God in this life as we all await the promised life in the next.

God’s peace be with you. Amen.