Part Two:
Updated reading of the writings of St. Teresa of Jesus
I. Approaching the context of our time based on Teresa's experience
23. The charisma that arises from the life and writings of Mother Teresa has spread and enriched over the centuries thanks to a deeper understanding of her works and her charismatic experience, adopted by the Statutes of both brothers and sisters, as well as the Secular Order of the Teresian Carmel. Thanks to this renewed awareness: “we have today, or at least we can have, such knowledge of our charism, as perhaps never before in our history. Today more than ever, our saints and the spirituality that our religious family embodies are the subjects of interest to various readers inside and outside the church, who justifiably ask us to share this wealth with them.
Yet we must ask ourselves how we can [we today] respond to the demands of the signs of the times in the church and in the world and to the great and legitimate human and religious aspirations of new generations, in order to more effectively and currently fulfill the mission of the Teresian Carmel in the third millennium.”1
In other words: “It is therefore necessary to know and understand the world in which we live, its expectations, desires, and often the dramatic nature characteristic of it,”2 and not to doubt that the most sublime foundation of human dignity is the calling of man to unity with God (cf. GS 19).3 The Teresian charisma, as already stated, was shaped by an intense mystical experience of prayer and reached its full development in light of the social and religious events of Teresa's time, to which this nun tries to respond with her own life as depicted in her writings and her foundational work. It is a mysticism, embodied in historical reality, sensitive to events and engaged in service.
24. The attitude of Mother Teresa requires from us the ability to know and discern what is happening around us, in a world marked by secularization and postmodernism, atheism, and disbelief, perceived particularly in the Western world as a globalizing culture that is spreading into other geographical areas. Nevertheless, there are paradoxically increasingly frequent signs of religious awakening and the search for spirituality that would respond to the deepest uncertainties of human beings. There are voices that say that for the 21st century to remain Christian, mysticism is needed, a regain of the experience of faith. At the same time, we uncover the crisis of the identity of man as such, who would like to define himself without any reference to God, which attacks his dignity and the transcendent values inscribed in his being, for man is an "open I," open—as if wounded—by the passion for transcendence. Teresian spirituality, focused on man as God's dwelling, open to communion with God and able to receive Him in the innermost part of the Castle, helps us realize human dignity, which contemporary culture threatens. Educating a person to the Teresian contemplative stance therefore also means helping him discover his true identity.
25. Along with the crisis of man and the reality of atheism, attention must also be given to the unjust conditions, poverty, and exclusion from society [in the contemporary world]. This situation is also related to God's revelation and the possibility of such a human response to it, which would be inspired by the Teresian experience. Christian spirituality, which seeks to fruitfully accept the challenges of the 21st century, must necessarily confront the reality of poverty. Concern for the poor is an element clearly present in the very sources of Christian revelation. An experience of God cannot take place in isolation, in disregard and lack of attention to the suffering of people. Contemplation that does not take into account this painful reality of our society is biblically reprehensible, just as is liturgy that ignores the suffering of the poor and defenseless, as the prophets have already condemned.
26. One of the signs of the renewal of religious life and contemporary Christianity is their deep rooting in the Gospel. This is what the Second Vatican Council referred to: “a continuous return to the sources of all Christian life,” and termed the following of Christ: “the highest rule” of life according to the Gospel (cf. PC 2), with fidelity to “the charism of the founders,” considered as “the fruit of the Holy Spirit, which still acts in the church” (ET 11). Every charism, as “an experience of” the Spirit, represents a renewed way of receiving the Gospel,4 a new spirituality that expresses the Gospel and remains open throughout history, so that it may be continually deepened and developed through the special gifts of those who participate in it (cf. MR 11). Christ is the embodied Gospel, the center and ultimate norm of every consecrated life, the source and goal of every charism. The Teresian charism represents an original way of reading the Gospel, contemplating Christ, and becoming like Him in one of the aspects of His mystery.
27. Teresa's originality, her charism in the church, arises from the fact that Teresa becomes like Christ through the way of knowledge through experience, namely through her Christocentric mystical experience (cf. 1K 9,1-3; 26,6; 27,2-8 etc.). In this sense, her charism is authentic and truly new within the spiritual life of the church (cf. MR 12). Its novelty and effect, which it has achieved in terms of the qualitative growth of Christian spirituality, can rightly be explained as a new way of experiencing the Gospel, which was a response to the restlessness of her time and, in a certain sense, to the needs of all times.
The birth of her work, although it has its roots in the ancient Carmelite tradition, is closely linked to the way her inner spiritual journey unfolded: she was deeply inspired by the spirit of the Gospel and the Carmelite ideal of hermitage and contemplation, which culminated in a new creative and foundational enterprise: the Teresian Carmel. This meaning of Teresa's charism as an “experience” of the Spirit makes her spiritual experience the soul and the driving force of the new Carmel, the expansive force that propels its [rapid] growth to [other] European countries, to France, Italy, the Flanders. The same reason also explains the great spread of her writings. They provide an introduction to the Christian experience.
This implies the role of the Discalced Carmel today: to live the Teresian charism intensely, to introduce today’s person into the Teresian contemplative experience, to understand the signs of the times, and to promote the spread of Teresa's writings. All this in the spirit of Teresa's fundamental belief that without experience true knowledge cannot be acquired. Experience is the key to every understanding, also in terms of knowing God, for God Himself is the object of experience to the extent that He is the object of faith, which is the only thing that connects man with God (cf. M 1, 1,4) and in which the reality of God is rather perceived [indirectly] (state of theopaties) than known.
II. Some basic life-giving elements of Teresa's experience and teaching
28. In accordance with the religious sensitivity and manner of living the Christian faith today, Teresa's experience, unlike other mystical trends of a metaphysical and Neoplatonic nature, is primarily personal and Christocentric. It all happens through the irreplaceable mediation of Jesus Christ: “I saw clearly that through these doors we must enter if we want the sovereign Majesty to reveal great mysteries to us” (1K 22,6). Essential to Teresian mysticism is the perception of Christ's glorified humanity. This is the pillar that supports us and the life of our life (cf. 7H 2,6). Thus it has been from Teresa's conversion (cf. 1K 9,1) to the discovery of Christ as the living book, in which “the truths are seen” and which “leaves so well imprinted what is to be read and done, in a way that cannot be forgotten!” (1K 26,6).
29. If Christ is the foundation and content of Teresian mysticism, then the theological experience of prayer is the most personal characteristic of the Teresian charism, clarifying the meaning of the new Carmel as well as the teaching role of Teresa's writings. Teresa— as Paul VI recalls on the occasion of her proclamation as teacher of the church— exercised “in her religious family, in the church and in the world through her lasting and current message: the message of prayer.”
Teresa rediscovered contemplation. This brought with it an offer of her specific forms and practices available to Christians of all states (cf. CV 19,15; 23,5), the introduction of a new pedagogy [in terms of prayer], the offer of initiation into prayer and methods of its development. Thanks to the pedagogical charge of Teresa's writings, the Teresian charism of contemplation transforms within the bosom of the church into something self-evident, so much so that today it is impossible to strive for a Christian life without living this theological dimension, indeed even mysticism. In this context, the important text of the Catechism of the Catholic Church should be read, stating that mysticism represents the fullness of the Christian life, understood as an ever more intimate union with Christ (cf. KKC 2014), and the pedagogy of contemplation (cf. ibid. 2709–2719).
30. Teresa's charism, her mystical experience of Christ and contemplative ideal in the service of the church, are visibly embodied in what she later presents as “our style of mortification, sisterhood, and recreation” (cf. Z 13,5).
Her ideal of communal life consists of this trio of elements:
- the community is primarily “the body of Christ” (CE 20,11) according to the model of the radical early church, for He is present in the midst of the community (cf. 1K 32,11), He is “the Lord of the house” (CV 17,7) and “the one who gathered us here” (CV 1,5; 3,1);
- the community lives the demands of consistent equality and true love (cf. CV 4,7; 7,9), everything in it is obediently governed according to the Gospel by effective, freely given, and selfless love (CV 4,11; 6–7; 5H 3,7–12), with the commitment to work manually (cf. St 28);
- the community is characterized by humanity, which is characterized by distinctive and for that time unusual traits: education, human virtues, gentleness, prudence, and discernment; simplicity, kindness, and joy (cf. CV 41,7–8; VC 42; NMI 43).
31. The founding intention of Carmel has a clear Marian character (cf. 1K 33,14). Thus, Teresa of Jesus, who very early in her life experiences the power of Mary's intercession (cf. 1K 1,7), presents (to her community) the Holy Virgin as the Mother and Lady of the Order (cf. Z 29,23; 3H 1,3), as an example of prayer and self-denial on the journey of faith (cf. 6H 7,13n.), as a woman devoted in body and soul to listening to and contemplating God's word (cf. M 5,2; 6,7), always receptive to the inspirations of the Holy Spirit and linked to Christ's Easter mystery by love, pain, and joy (cf. 7H 4,5).
It follows that communion with Mary permeates and marks with a Marian seal all elements of our life: fraternal life, a spirit of prayer and contemplation, apostolate in all its forms, and even the very evangelical self-denial (cf. St 47–52). The evangelical figure of the Virgin Mary is not only the model of our life, but also encourages us to follow in her footsteps and as true “poor of the Lord” “to shape our lives to that of our Lady by continual, faith-derived contemplation of God's word and varied expressions of love” (St 49). Led by Mary by the hand, we enter into the mystery of Christ and the church and become, like her, bearers of Jesus and the joyful proclamation of his kingdom. Therefore, the Marian dimension, along with the Christocentric dimension, is undoubtedly one of the fundamental keys to the reading of Teresa.
And in Mary's presence, St. Joseph, the humble servant of Christ and His Mother, is a living example of the prayer-soaked communion with Jesus for us (cf. St 52).
