Carmelite wisdom to encourage & inspire
St. Teresa of Avila praises the Cross in one of her less famous but no less powerful poems: “Captive is he that loves you not, / No freedom does he know [...] You are the freedom / from our dread captivity.”
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In this Advent season, Bishop Silvio José Báez, o.c.d. urges us to adopt the prophetic rebelliousness of St. John the Baptist so that we don’t resign ourselves to interior mediocrity or injustice in the world around us.
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Our Discalced Carmelite bishop from Nicaragua, Bishop Silvio José Báez, continues to employ every means possible to advocate for freedom and justice for those who suffer in his country, even from his exile in the United States. Recently, he shared a video excerpt from his remarks in March 2019 at a press availability concerning political prisoners: they "are not a bargaining chip."
Writing to a former student from St. Magdalena teachers college in Speyer, St. Edith Stein assumes the role of spiritual director. In this letter from 1936, she counsels the young woman not to seek changes that are "apt to disturb one's inner peace" because whenever we attempt to get rid of one cross, we usually get a heavier cross, instead. Two years later, this student would become a Discalced Carmelite postulant in the Carmel of Kordel.
"The soul must practice the following instructions if it wishes to attain in a short time holy recollection and spiritual silence, nakedness, and poverty of spirit, where one enjoys the peaceful comfort of the Holy Spirit," writes St John of the Cross in the introduction to The Precautions.
Poet Jessica Powers ponders the first stanza of Saint John of the Cross's poem, "The Dark Night". She asks, "How does one hush one's house?..."
Bishop Silvio José Báez says that in our lives, "everything can begin anew with renewed strength and new dreams" when "love is what drives us from within." Even St. Teresa of Avila agrees: "love alone is what gives value to all things."
Bishop Báez, preaching on the encounter of the Risen Christ with his disciples offers a timely commentary: "The Risen Christ always frees us and opens up horizons of mercy. Whoever believes in him and welcomes him always receives forgiveness as a gift..."
Commenting on the Gospel story of Jesus and the woman caught in adultery, Fr. Denis-Marie Ghesquières, OCD writes, "Jesus challenges each one of the onlookers to search his heart and, faced with the woman's sin, to question himself! A new path can open up by setting out from the truth about oneself in the presence of Jesus..."
Faith doesn't lead us to sacrifice our reason; on the contrary, the experience of God elevates it—making it noble, unconstrained, and worthy.
The soul through original sin is a captive in the mortal body, subject to passions and natural appetites; when liberated from this bondage and submission, it considers its escape, in which it is unnoticed, unimpeded, and unapprehended by its passions and appetites, a sheer grace.
Letting ourselves be conquered by the loving gaze of Jesus is the beginning of a new and eternal life.
To pray for the conversion of sinners and to move the mercy of God
Love is not simply a feeling, it’s an act of freedom
No Caesar of this world can demand that which belongs to God.
Compared to the hell of the ships, the island seemed a veritable paradise
To be a disciple of Jesus means to take up the cross and follow him
So that they can find in the captivity of their bodies, freedom for their soul
The Fall... was rooted in a disturbance of social justice
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Let nothing disturb you, Let nothing frighten you, All things are passing away: God never changes. Patience obtains all things. Whoever has God lacks nothing; God alone suffices. ~ St. Teresa of Avila
Monasterio de las Batuecas Carmelitas Descalzos
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