Teresa of Avila, answered from the texts and cited to the page.
A return, and I came to know it as one late and by another's mouth. When I began St. Joseph's I did not even know that our rule, before it was mitigated, required us to possess nothing; I meant to found a house with revenue, so that we should be free of anxiety about all we needed, and I never thought of the many anxieties that property brings in its train.1
A holy woman of our Order, who could not read, understood perfectly what I was ignorant of, though I had read the Constitutions so often. She had gone to Rome on foot and barefoot for the faculties, and when she showed me her Briefs and told me of the primitive rule, I saw it was right.2 So the novelty, if there was one, was not mine. I was no inventor, only a woman who had read her own rule badly for years.
As for disobedience, I feared that very charge. I thought they would never consent, and would tell me I was committing follies and bringing suffering on others. Had it concerned only myself, nothing would have held me back; it would have been my joy to keep the counsels of Christ our Lord.3 The Order's resistance was not for want of reason, for a poor house depends wholly on God, and that frightens those who rely on rents.
But that is the very point of it. Why thirteen, and why poor? Because any little corner does for thirteen poor women, and the convents must be neither large nor handsome. Poverty is a strong wall, as St. Clare used to say, and if it is real it guards purity and every other virtue better than fine buildings do.4 It looks ill, my daughters, to build fine houses with needy men's alms.
Ours should resemble our King, who had no home but the stable of Bethlehem and the Cross where He died.4 I did not choose this from my own cleverness. When I was penniless and could not see how to pay the workmen, our Lord reproved me: "Oh, covetousness of the human race, thinking that even the whole earth is too little for it! how often have I slept in the open air, because I had no place to shelter Me!" And what I feared would be our ruin proved our provision.5
Once the poverty was settled by the sanction of the Holy Father, so that it should never be otherwise and we possess no revenues, His Majesty supplied all our wants most abundantly, without our asking anybody.6 The same holds for the friars. Fray Antonio went to Duruelo, in a house so poor that he had provided hour-glasses, five of them, so as not to go without regular hours, and hardly anything to sleep on.
He thought himself settled in great comfort. I have seen greater spirituality and greater inward joy where bodily conveniences were wanting than later where the house was large and the comforts many.7 We should remember our true founders, the holy fathers from whom we are sprung, who attained the vision of God by the way of poverty and humility.7
So I say it was no novelty, but the old rule kept, and the mitigation was the novelty. Those who resisted were not wicked, but they were defending a comfort their founders never had.
The rule of Carmel was given for solitude, poverty and prayer, and the mitigated observance had made the Incarnation a house of a hundred and eighty women, visitors, patrons and precedence.8 She returned to the primitive rule: a few nuns who could be friends, enclosure, poverty without fixed income so that the house depends on God and offends no one by begging, no distinctions of rank, two hours of mental prayer, and recreation.
She did it with the general's licence and the Pope's briefs, and when the Calced and the nuncio called it disobedience she wrote to the King. She was not founding a new order but keeping the old one as its founders kept it; the novelty was the mitigation.91011
Until I spoke to her, I never knew that our rule, before it was mitigated, required of us that we should possess nothing; nor was I going to found a monastery without revenue, for my intention was that we should be without anxiety about all that was necessary for us, and I did not think of the many anxieties which the possession of property brings in its train.The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus
This holy woman, taught of our Lord, perfectly understood--though she could not read--what I was ignorant of, notwithstanding my having read the Constitutions so often; and when she told me of it, I thought it rightThe Life of St. Teresa of Jesus
If this concerned only myself, nothing should have kept me back,--on the contrary, it would have been my great joy to think that I was observing the counsels of Christ our LordThe Life of St. Teresa of Jesus
as St. Clare used to say, poverty is a strong wall.... if poverty is real it guards purity and all the other virtues better than do fine buildings.... any little corner does for thirteen poor women.The Way of Perfection
Oh, covetousness of the human race, thinking that even the whole earth is too little for it! how often have I slept in the open air, because I had no place to shelter Me!The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus
It cost me no small labour to have this matter settled by the plenary sanction and authority of the Holy Father, so that it shall never be otherwise, and we possess no revenues.The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus
I have seen greater spirituality and also greater inward joy where bodily conveniences seemed to be wanting than I have seen later on where the house was large and the comforts many.The Book of the Foundations, with the Visitation of the Nunneries and the Constitutions
Given at Lyons, October 1, in the fifth year of our pontificate. *° The first of September and of October of the fifth year of Innocent IV correspond to 1247 not 1248 as is frequently, though erroneously, stated, TEE, CONSTITUTIONS CONSTITUTIONS FOR THE SISTERS OF THE ORDER OF OUR LADY OF MOUNT CARMEL OF THE PRIMITIVE RULE UNRELAXED, GIVEN BY THE MOST REVEREND FATHER FRAY JUAN BAUTISTA RUBEO, GENERAL OF THE SAID…The Book of the Foundations, with the Visitation of the Nunneries and the Constitutions
It could matter little to you if the feast-day Mass were the conventual one, and the chaplain said a low Mass for you shortly before it. There are but few such days — will you not give up your own wishes a little on this point to oblige me, although the feast-day should be one you do not keep? Remember that it would make no difference to you, but would be a mercy to the nuns, a good work, and a great favour to me.The Letters of Saint Teresa Vol 1
Our Lord directed all from beginnings so mean that only His Majesty could have raised them to the state they are in now. May He be blessed for ever. Amen. CHARTER: SULy, CONTINUATION OF THE FOUNDATION OF THE FIRST HOUSE OF DIS- CALCED CARMELITE FRIARS.. SOME ACCOUNT OF THEIR LIFE AND OF THE IMPROVEMENT OF THOSE HAMLETS TO THE HONOUR: AND GLORY OF GOD 1. S. John of the Cross goes to Duruelo.—z.The Book of the Foundations, with the Visitation of the Nunneries and the Constitutions
I was in spirit restless, yet my restlessness was not harassing, but rather pleasant. I saw clearly that it was the work of God, and that His Majesty had furnished my soul with fervour, so that I might be able to digest other and stronger food than I had been accustomed to eat.The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus
The work for which she was called a gadabout in her lifetime and a saint after it; the modern historians ask what poverty without endowment meant in a city built on honour and rents.