Week 15 · mystical

Teresa of Ávila

Teresa of Ávila spent twenty years as a mediocre nun. She prayed without feeling anything, went through the motions, and later admitted she'd wasted decades being lukewarm. Then, at age 39, she had a conversion experience so intense she could barely describe it. She spent the rest of her life founding 17 convents, writing some of the most important mystical texts in Christianity, and becoming the first woman named a Doctor of the Church.

“"Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours." She wrote that to her nuns, and she meant it literally. The divine doesn't float above the world. It works through whoever is willing to show up.”