St. Teresa of Avila was born into a well-to-do family in Spain. Educated by Augustinian nuns, she joined the Carmelite order of nuns at age eighteen. Following a period of serious illness, she went on to become a leader in the order. Combining contemplative living with practical action, she reformed the seriously deteriorated order and founded sixteen new convents.
Her most well known work, The Interior Castle, uses the image of seven mansions within a castle to explain the life of prayer. Our selection introduces the reader to the final "mansion" in the mystical inward journey to "spiritual marraige" with God. (Click here for our selection from The Interior Castle.)
From Forrest Baird, Human Thought and Action (University Press of America, © 1992)