Today is the feast day of St Teresa of Ávila, who is one of just four female Doctors of the Church. 10 facts about her:
She was born on 28 March 1515 and given the name Teresa Sánchez de Cepeda Dávila y Ahumada. Her father, Alonso Sánchez de Cepeda, was a successful wool merchant and one of the richest men in Ávila. Her mother, Beatriz de Ahumada y Cuevas, was his second wife. She was the fifth of twelve children, two of whom were half siblings from her father’s first marriage.
Teresa was brought up as a Christian, and as a child seemed to display hints of sainthood to come – she and her brother Rodrigo liked to read about the lives of saints and at the age of seven, she ran away with him; the plan was to run away to the “land of the Moors” in the hope that they’d get their heads chopped off and become martyrs. They didn’t, however, get very far. Her uncle happened to spot the two runaways just outside the city walls and brought them home.
As a teen, Teresa was more interested in reading romances than in religion. Her mother died when she was 14. Her brothers left home around then and headed to the Americas as was common at the time. Teresa, by all accounts, became a bit of a problem to her father, a grief stricken and rebellious teenager. When she was 15, he packed her off to an Augustinian convent to complete her education.
While Teresa enjoyed her time at the convent, she wasn’t that keen on becoming a nun at first. When she did choose religious life, at the age of 20, it was likely more of a rebellion against marriage as the only other choice and the perception that nuns had more freedom than wives. She chose a particularly easy going convent, the Carmelite Convent of the Incarnation. Her father didn’t approve. Perhaps he wanted to marry her off, but equally it might have been because, as a pious man, he’d have preferred her to join a stricter order. Another possible factor was that the convent had been built over a Jewish burial ground, and Teresa’s ancestors were Jewish.
For many years, Teresa struggled with the religious life. She wrote that she "tried as hard as I could to keep Jesus Christ present within me....My imagination is so dull that I had no talent for imagining or coming up with great theological thoughts."
Then she caught malaria. After a seizure, the other nuns believed she was dead and even dug her grave, but after four days she recovered, but was never quite the same again. She suffered from paralysis for several years and her health was never good again. It was during this time that she started to experience the religious visions which had eluded her before, and she began to practice austerity.
This led to a desire to reform the Carmelite order. Teresa felt the order had lost its way a bit, and should return to a life of contemplation and prayer; that the nuns should stop wearing shoes and spend more time in the convent praying and less in the community. At the age of 43, she decided to found a new convent, St. Joseph's, based on these ideals. It wasn’t a popular move, however. Her fellow nuns thought she should spend more time raising money for the convent she was already in, and the local community weren’t happy either. She was denounced by many and even became a person of interest to the Spanish Inquisition. It was partly the threat of the Inquisition which motivated her to write her life story, knowing it was likely a matter of life or death. She had to qualify any profound religious insights with "But what do I know? I'm just a wretched woman." However, it worked, and after reading the book, the Inquisition cleared her.
She was known for her sense of humour. One of her famous quotes is “Lord, save us from gloomy saints." Another, uttered one day when she was having a hard time, was a comment to God Himself: “If this is how You treat Your friends, no wonder why You have so few of them!"
She died at the age of 67, just at the time Catholic Europe was making the switch from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar. She probably died in the early hours of what would have been 5 October, but because of the calendar change, her death took place on 15 October, hence that is her feast day.
St Teresa of Ávila is patron of Spain, sick people (especially those who suffer from headaches), people in religious orders, chess, people ridiculed for their piety, and Lacemakers.
Beta
(Combat Team Series #2)
Steff was abducted by an evil alien race, the Orbs, at fourteen. Used as a weapon for years, he eventually escapes, but his problems are just beginning. How does a man support himself when his only work experience is a paper round and using an Orb bio-integrated gun?
Warlord is an alien soldier who knows little but war. When the centuries-old conflict which ravaged his planet ends, he seeks out another world where his skills are still relevant. There are always wars on Earth, it seems. However, none of Earth's powerful armies want him.
Natalie has always wanted to visit England and sees a chance to do so while using her martial arts skills, but there are sacrifices she must make in order to fulfil her dream.
Maggie resorted to crime to fund her sister's medical care. She uses her genetic variant abilities to gain access to the rooms of wealthy hotel guests. The Ballards look like rich pickings, but they are not what they seem. When Maggie targets them, little does she know that she is walking into a trap.
Hotel owner Hamilton Lonsdale puts together a combat team to pit against those of other multi-millionaires. He recruits Warlord, Natalie, Maggie and Steff along with a trained gorilla, a probability-altering alien, a stockbroker whose work of art proved to be much more than he'd bargained for, a marketing officer who can create psionic forcefields, a teleporting member of the landed gentry, and a socially awkward fixer. This is Combat Team Beta.
Steff never talks about his time with the Orbs, until he finds a woman who lived through it, too. Steff believes he has finally found happiness, but it is destined to be short-lived. He is left with an unusual legacy which he and Team Beta struggle to comprehend; including why something out there seems determined to destroy it.
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