The Interior Castle Summary

In 1577 she began the composition of her masterpiece, The Interior Castle, a disguised autobiography written in the third person, while her Life was in the hands of the Inquisition. The book describes the mystical life through the symbolism of seven mansions, with the first three mansions as the pre-mystical journey to God and the next four mansions as growth in the mystical life. With the imagery of the Song of Songs in the background, Teresa saw spiritual betrothal occurring in the sixth mansion and spiritual marriage in the seventh. For her the test of growth in the mystical life was love of neighbor. Although she was profoundly contemplative, she led an active life not only as a reformer of Carmelite life, but also as an adviser to and

The nuns who were present at her death testified that a luscious, paradisiacal scent emanated from her body, and later, when one of her confessors ordered her grave there to be opened, her body was still intact and redolent of lilies. The confessor severed various parts of her body to be distributed among her powerful admirers, and her cult spread rapidly throughout Spain. One of her hands ended up with Generalissimo Franco, leader of Spain, who kept it by his bed until his death in 1975.

Teresa of Avila was beatified in 1614 and canonized in 1622 (along with Ignatius of Loyola, Francis Xavier and Philip Neri, and was one of the first two women to be named a Doctor of the Church, by Pope Paul VI in 1970 in recognition of her outstanding contribution to Mystical Theology and Christian

One such hamlet is known as Aljustrel; and it is here and more especially in the surrounding rocky pasturelands that the story is centered…

During the last three apparitions, Our Lady promised the children that the last time She would appear, in October; She would affect a ‘miracle’ that everyone would and thereby believe. Lucia had repeated this promise to others and the news of it had spread like wildfire throughout the country.

On the morning of October 13, 1917, fear and panic prevailed in Fatima. Rain was pouring from the heavens, a sad beginning for the glorious day promised by Our Lady and the children. The rain, however, did not dampen the spirits of the many thousands of people who came from every section of Portugal to witness the miracle promised. Even the daily newspapers, until now so inimical to the happenings at Fatima, sent reporters to the scene, and since for days afterwards they carried long articles on the unusual events; others, will use excerpts from the newspaper accounts to give an authentic history of the