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Lenten Speaker Series March 10

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welcome thank you all for coming and praying with us today I'm sorry to announce that our speaker has not yet arrived so I want to say a quick prayer for sister Kathleen dumbass I got lost or were they don't got a nail or anyting with caramel like they don't necessarily kill it carry cell phones and everything so let's say a prayer for her and then our plan B for tonight will be from Steve give you some Reflections on Saint Teresa of Avila and then I'll follow up with a little reading from the Catholic online on that Saint won't be as good as having the live speaker here but that's our plan to you speaker ever does not show up okay name of the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit amen heavenly father thank you for this evening thank you for us to gather to pray and praise you and to learn about all the Aureus work that you do in your Saints we lift up Sister Kathleen Dominic with you just ask you to protect her keep her safe help her with whatever it is that she needs today and we just asked you to be with us tonight we would father Steve he gives an impromptu talk and just help us to understand Saint Teresa of Avila help us to understand her and her spirituality and learn from her as a way to get closer to you thank you for this time in Jesus name Amen in the father and the son and the holy spirit amen has graciously agreed to help us out and give us an impromptu talk on Teresa and the Carmelite spirituality this is really an impromptu and luckily I had stations this evening because with the speaker not showing up I guess I'm jumping again who was the man who tried to win the city beautiful the world Ward and doing so what he decided to do was he went to the greenhouse and he bought plants and he bought flowers and he bought grass seed and then he went to the Conch StoryBots concrete and then what he did as he began to decorate his house so we planted the flowers planted the grass seed took the concrete repaid the driveway and the sidewalk in front of his house and he looked at it and saw the is very good so it goes up onto the porch he sits in a seat in his rocking chair he's rocking back and forth when he notices out of the corner of his eye is the dog next door any books with the dog and the dog looks him and he looks at the dog and the dog looks up at him and he says oh no the dog comes over runs to the flower bed once through the grass runs through the concrete needs his paw prints and runs home but this play the band bounces out of his chair he goes back into the garage lays more grass seed plants more flowers gets the concrete page the concrete again this time he goes inside he goes into the kitchen open up the refrigerator and as he opened up the refrigerator he's getting ready to pour himself a glass of iced tea to reward himself when he looks out the window and the dog next door the dog is looking up at him and he looking down at the dog the dog. And he says don't you dare the dog runs through the flower bed through the grass seeds needs his paw prints on the concrete and runs home at this point the man is livid so he goes into the and he tells his wife this is it and she's baffled as to what he's talking about so it goes out Lance the flowers lays the grass seed puts down the concrete with this point he's coming back in there is the dog so he looks at the dog the dog looked at him nieces don't you dare this is the end of you if you do this but this time the dog doesn't only run through the grass and threw the flower bed he actually rolls around in the concrete at least his body print and that at this point the man goes into the bedroom angrily he goes into the closet he opens up the door and his wife says sitting on the bed honey what are you doing and he says I'm trying to win the city beautiful that way she says you're doing fine honey you're doing a great job and he says no but the dog next door is going to ruin it and so at that point she said so what you going to do he says I'm going to kill you. I'm going to get the shotgun and his wife says honey help me to understand this you love dogs you are veterinarian by trade and at that point the man says honey you're right I do love dogs I love dogs in the abstract not in the car Crete the Sydney wheel challenge to live out our faith in concrete ways and one way that we can live out our faith in a concrete way is follower the call of the Lord wherever the Lord leads us I can remember early on in my early days of priesthood I felt called to a Trappist monastery as a monk a silent month and in many ways Saint Teresa of Avila was one who was called to a monastic way of life so in being called to the monastery I found myself going through the entire process so went through the psychological testing I took time down it gets so and Neptune Albion South Carolina I got to know the month talked with a novice director talked with the Abbott and then it came to a point where I realized okay I need to make a decision to enter or not and it was at that point in that crossroads that's something took place I found God calling me in a different direction and that was into the Counseling World which eventually led me to my internship in New Orleans and then back to Cincinnati into a full-time counseling position at Seton High School sometimes we come to those Crossroads in our lives and we have to listen to what God is telling us we live out our concrete face by following where the Lord leads us another way that we can live out our concrete date is to realize it sometimes the Lord calls us some very extraordinary ways that we would never dream imaginable and that open for me very early on just as I was finishing my time at Seton High School is Bishop Modell who is now deceased came to me because one of our priests yd Conlin had died in the country of he was serving as a missionary and Bishop Modell came to me and says why don't you consider doing this go down spend three weeks in grenade and then come back and decide so I went down to Grenada I spend I've lived with and helped out Monsignor Lemon Thai who was the vicar General there and at that particular point I was doing funerals and doing a lot of things and then when I came back to ship Modell's says what do you think I said they roll up the sidewalks at 2 in the afternoon that's not me and so at that point then I had went to visit Dale Uncle who's one of our priests serving in Kenya in Africa and so I went to our Three Rivers spend some time there learn kiswahili and came back from there and I felt called to that till I get this call from Sister Janet Carol who is the director of the United States China Bureau which is a subgroup of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and I was like sister dance this is a surprising cause you since I know that you're looking at missionary work I said who's looking at missionary work people are asking me to consider this so she says will let me send you the Beijing and the couple of places over there for a week and then come back so I came back I talk when I said I think about it so it took about two years I opened up my drawer at one point it my desk and I saw that in there and then I called Sister Janet I said okay let's see where this goes so was the concrete way was realizing that just by opening that desk drawer God was saying something to me and then it began the process of moving into Mission work in China and that's a little more okay did they going to Africa Grenada or any of these other countries because then heading into China One of the key things there is that you would do your orientation in the states with the National Council of churches then you would when did China in Hong Kong do your orientation there with the Marino's then you would go being sent into Wuhan where I spent two years I was sent by the Colombians with a direct supervisor Pacific section so that they could not Trace you and then they're teaching in the university and working with the underground Church never dreamed that would ever happen in my life but when you follow the call of God sometimes God takes you to play you never dreamed imaginable and just imagine that from a Trappist monastery to working in a clandestine way as a missionary which is against the laws of China so in the Our Lives we have to remember that when God calls us we have to listen but then we also have to make a decision are we willing to follow where God is calling us concrete way in our lives and sometimes that uncomfortable sometimes that's downright painful sometimes that involves a lot of suffering but if you're willing to accept that we will realize that the grace of God we will rest in God's hands wherever God leads us if I reflect on Saint Teresa of Avila who was a Carmelite and compare that with the Trappist it is a location in which one is donated their whole life to contemplatively prayer so you don't really have a whole lot of contact necessarily with the outside world for the Trap pick it up at three 4 in the morning they pray the office of readings that they called matins then they celebrate morning prayer it gets so many it's like 5:30 in the morning in mepkin it's like 4:45 in the morning and then Mass usually companies that out at 5:36 then you're out working and working as usually manual labor and get somebody at that time they no longer had this but it was a cheese and fruit cake factory in Mexican they had 7000 chickens so they were producing eggs and then you would have a midday prayer afternoon to buy lexio Divina which is spiritual reading reading from scripture excetera and then evening prayer night prayer Abbott with less each person at the end of night prayer you be in bed by 7:38 but up at 3 in the morning it's just a different way of living and for those who are Carmelite stop it there's two word living in Cloister type communities are ones who pray for us and pray for our needs and pray that we are able to answer God's call in our lives everyday not necessarily any but yet one that is very essential in our lives and there are some groups that now pray for the needs of each of us like some of the Prairie lions excetera and those people are praying that were able face the trials in our lives but also pray that we are able to follow God's path in our lives and following God's path will take us to places we never dreamed imaginable and just a very soon way when I was skydiving before I became vicar General and Chancellor the Archdiocese and didn't have time for vacations one time I was in Switzerland and I decided this would be beautiful skydive in the Swiss I was talking with cuz usually when you're doing a free fall there they will give you like a small radio and don't talk you into the Airfield where they will talk you into wherever the field is why I told him I said now I don't know German so I presume you're going to talk in English right yeah we talk in English well then I'm up there and as you're pulling the ripcord in your wondering okay how am I going to get down here all of a sudden I'm hearing German so I land on the side of an Alp so you just never know what's going to happen in your lives and that is why Faith allows us to live with the ambiguities of life are people in Christ poster communities know that but each one of us knows that as well so we are challenged to live our lives faithful to God and whatever form fashion that that may take so this evening I will then invite Donna to come forward as she will reflect on sink we serve a lot and she has some information there but please keep our speaker in your prayers tonight because we're not really sure why she is not here this evening at this point thank you for the Steve okay I'm planning these toxins might like my worst fear of all that the speaker just doesn't show up or whatever Plan B I got this off of Catholic online they have bios for the Saints and the Saints awesome speak in their own words so it's kind of interesting Teresa of Avila was born in Avila Spain the timing was a 1515 so about 20 years after Christopher discovered Columbus Christopher Columbus discovered the Americas and about two years before the Lutheran frosted Reformation so that's kind of the timing of it Prince's father was rigidly honest and Pia but he may have carried his strictness to extremes they're love romance novels but because her husband objected to these fanciful books she hid them from him this but Teresa in the middle especially since she liked the romance to her father told her never to lie but her mother told her not to tell her father the later she said she was always afraid that no matter what she did she's going to do something wrong when she was 7 years old she convinced her older brother that they should go off to the land the Moors and beg them for the love of God to cut their heads off they got as far as the road from the city before an uncle found them and brought them back some people have used the store is an early example of sanctity but this author thinks it's better used as an early example of her ability to stir up trouble after this incident she led a fairly ordinary life though she was convinced that she was a hore call center as a teenager she cared only about boys clothes flirting and rebelling when she was 16 her father decided she was out of control so he sent her to the convent or she hated it but eventually she began to enjoy it partly because of her growing love for God and partly because the convent was a lot less strict than her father still when the time came for her to choose between marriage and the religious life she had a tough time making that decision she'd watched a difficult marriage ruined her mother on the other hand being a nun didn't sound like much fun when she finally chose religious life she did so because she thought it was the only safe place for someone as prone to sin as she was once installed at the Carmelite convent permanently she started to learn and practice mental prayer in which she tried as hard as I could to keep Jesus present within me my imagination is so dull that if I had no Talent imagining or coming up with great theological thoughts Teresa pray this way off and on for 18 years without feeling like she was getting any results part of the reason for the trouble was that the that was not the safe place that she assumed it would be many women who had no place to go wound up at a Convent whether they had vocations or not they were encouraged to stay away from con for long periods of time to cut down on expenses nuns would arrange their veils attractively and wear jewelry Prestige depended not on piety but on money it was a steady stream of visitors in The Parlor and parties that included young men what spiritual life there was involved hysteria weeping exaggerated Penance nosebleeds and self induced vision Teresa suffered the same problem that Saint Francis of Assisi did that she was too Charming everyone liked her and she liked being liked I found it easy to slip into worldly ways and ignore God the convent encouraged her to have visitors to whom she would teach mental prayer because their gifts held the helps the community anomic Lee but Teresa got more involved in flattery vanity and gossip then in spiritual guidance these weren't great since perhaps but they did keep her from God Theresa Fallon with malaria when she had a seizure people were so sure that she was dead that after she awoke 4 days later she learned that they had already dug a grave for afterwards she was Paris thanks for three years and was never completely well yet instead of helping her spiritually her sickness became an excuse to stop a prayer she couldn't be alone enough she said she wasn't the enough and so forth later she would say a prayer is an act of love words are not needed even a sickness distracts from thoughts all that is needed is the will to love for years she hardly prayed it all under the guise of humility she thought as a wicked sinner she didn't deserve to get favors from God but turning away from prayer was like and she quotes a baby turn away from his mother's breath what could be expected but death when at she was 41 a priest convinced her to go back to her prayer but she still found it I was more anxious for The Hour of Prayer to be over than I was to remain there I don't know what heavy Penance I would not have gladly undertaken rather than practice prayer she was distracted often this intellect is so wild but it doesn't seem to be anything else than a frantic man man no one can tie down Teresa sympathizes with those who have a difficult time we prayer all the trials we endure cannot being compared to these interior bullies yet her experience gives us wonderful descriptions of mental prayer for mental prayer in my opinion is nothing else than an intimate sharing between friends it means taking time frequently to be alone with him who we know love her the important thing is not to think but to love much and so do that which best stirrers you to love love is not great Delight but desire to please God in everything so as she stay Pray Again God gave her spiritual Delights the prayer of quiet we're God's presents overwhelmed her senses rapture's where God overcame her with glorious full of shnit prayer of Union where she felt the Son of God melt her soul sometimes her whole body was raised from the ground if she felt God was going to live V8 her body she's brushed out on the floor and called The Nuns to sit on her and hold her down far from being excited about these events she begged God not to give not to give me any more favors in public in her book C Annalise and the  mystical experiences the way a scientist would she never saw these gifts as rewards from God but the way he chastised her the more love felt the harder it was to offend God she says the memory of the favor God has granted does more to bring such a person back to God than all the infernal punishments a man her biggest fault was her friendship though she wasn't sending she was very attracted to her friends until God told her no longer do I want you to converse with human being but with angels and in an instant he gave her the freedom that she had been unable to achieve through years of effort after that God always came first in her life some friends however did like what was happening to her and got together to discuss some remedy for her to get rid of the visions concluding that she had been diluted by the devil they sent a Jesuit to analyzer the Jesuit assured her that our experiences were from God but soon everybody knew about it and was making fun of her so she really struggled with the validity of her experiences of God she describes these experiences in several of her books she she has an autobiography called the life of Teresa of Jesus she wrote the interior Castle as the pathway of her except that she took in her men prayer and also the way of perfection I'm so she died October 15th of 1582 and that's the feast day that we celebrate with her she's can I've been in 1622 and we celebrate her as a doctor of the church and as a Mystic so she has some wonderful reading that we can draw on with her experiences God and just the fact that you love God prayer is nothing more than loving God that's one of her wonderful takeaways that you find where are difficult if I I do if I go to the Adoration chapel and get distracted with so many things I'm just focusing on what help us to love God that's I think one of her main messages so I apologize that the speaker was in here thank you for staying we'll meet here next week we have next week is st. Patrick's day so we'll have mrs. Becky Hensler I'll come talk about Saint Patrick who else would we talk about on Saint Patrick's Day. Thank you all for coming God bless you make her call

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