Quote of the day, 18 June: St. Teresa of Avila

Not long ago a very learned man told me that souls who do not practice prayer are like people with paralyzed or crippled bodies; even though they have hands and feet they cannot give orders to these hands and feet.

Well now, we are not speaking to these crippled souls, for if the Lord Himself doesn’t come to order them to get up — as He did the man who waited at the side of the pool for thirty years [Jn 5:5] they are quite unfortunate and in serious danger. But we are speaking to other souls that, in the end, enter the castle. For even though they are very involved in the world, they have good desires and sometimes, though only once in a while, they entrust themselves to our Lord and reflect on who they are, although in a rather hurried fashion. During the period of a month they will sometimes pray, but their minds are then filled with business matters which ordinarily occupy them. They are so attached to these things that where their treasure lies their heart goes also [Mt 6:19-21].

Saint Teresa of Avila

The Interior Castle, I.1.6,8

Teresa of Avila, St. 1985, The Collected Works of St. Teresa of Avila, translated from the Spanish by Kavanaugh, K; Rodriguez, O, ICS Publications, Washington DC.