 Welcome to The Commentaries, a podcast series from Tan in which you'll learn how to read and understand history's greatest Catholic works from today's greatest Catholic scholars. In every series of The Commentaries, your expert host will be your personal guide to not just read the book, but to live the book, shining the light of its eternal truths into our modern darkness. Visit tancommentaries.com to get your copy of the book and to subscribe for access to all the great reading plans, new episodes, bonus content, and exclusive deals for listeners of The Commentaries. Welcome back. This is Day 9 of The Commentaries, series on St. Teresa of Avalos Interior Castle. I'm Father Timothy Reed from Charlotte, North Carolina. So today, we will finish our look at the fourth mansions of the Interior Castle. So remember this is the place where contemplative prayer begins to take place, according to God's will, and His grace. So this mansion is a sort of transition from the natural to the supernatural. Generally speaking, people who have advanced this far in their spiritual life have really grown in virtue. And at this point, God often gives what St. Teresa calls divine consolations, which as I've mentioned last time, originate in God and dilate or expand a person's heart. As we get into this third chapter, Teresa begins by actually taking a step back from divine consolations to discuss a prayer that she believes almost always precedes divine consolations, what she calls here the prayer of recollection. Now, just know carefully, she uses this term inconsistently across her writings. Also bear in mind that St. Teresa of Avalos, not always linear in her thoughts, she's more like a bee buzzing about from flower to flower in her writing, speaking of things as they come to her mind, which means that sometimes she's hard to follow, but it's also part of her charm as a writer. So she's taking a step back from divine consolations in this chapter to begin talking about the prayer of recollection. Now, as for the prayer of recollection, Teresa states that it helps prepare a soul for divine consolations, and she believes it's supernatural because it doesn't begin in oneself. Now to explain this phenomenon, she says, to imagine one's senses and powers of the soul as the inhabitants of the interior castle, and that after having fled the castle and joined the enemies outside for a while, they want to return, but they cannot do so by their own power, and yet they are gently drawn back in by God's mercy. So she writes in the second paragraph of this chapter, the king who holds his court within it sees their good will, and out of his great mercy desires them to return to him. Like a good shepherd, he plays so sweetly on his pipe that although scarcely hearing it, they recognize his call and no longer wander, but return like lost sheep to the mansions. So strong is this pastor's power over his flock that they abandon the worldly cares which misled them and re-enter the castle. This drawing inward that she's speaking about here, like a turtle drawing into a shell, doesn't happen through our own meditation of God dwelling within us, although she says that's a very good meditation. This only happens because of God giving us the grace. Now it's Teresa's belief that God gives us favor, the prayer of recollection, to those who have renounced the world, at least in their desires, in whom he desires to call to a higher life. And she encourages those who experience this drawing inward to thank God fervently for such a valuable gift because thanking God will actually dispose one for even greater graces. Saint Teresa then takes up the question of whether or not the mind can be put to rest in order to listen to God. She writes, some books advise that as a preparation for hearing what our Lord may say to us, we should keep our minds at rest, waiting to see what he will work in our souls. But unless His Majesty has begun to suspend our faculties, I cannot understand how we are to stop thinking without doing ourselves more harm than good. Appealing to the works of Saint Peter of Alcantara, Saint Teresa discusses her belief that the mind must continue acting until called to recollection by God's love, and she gives four reasons. She writes, firstly, he who reasons less and tries to do least does most in spiritual matters. Like beggars before a rich and powerful emperor, we must simply beg God for the supernatural favor and then wait with humility. If we have a sense from him that he has heard us, we should remain silent. If we are unsure that he has heard us, we must continue to beseech him. We mustn't try to induce this prayer. She writes, if however the king makes no sign of listening to us or of seeing us, there is no need to stand inert like adult, which the soul would resemble if it continued inactive. In this case, its dryness would greatly increase, and the imagination would be made more restless than before by its very effort to think of nothing. Our Lord wishes us at such a time to offer him our petitions and to place ourselves in his presence. He knows what is best for us. So with this first reason, the bottom line here is that God is in charge. There is nothing that we can do to make the prayer of recollection happen. And so the proper disposition in prayer is to be humble and to allow God to do whatever he chooses to do with us. You know, as we take our prayer life seriously, we can begin to get a little anxious about where we are in the interior castle, and that's not what we should do. We need to allow God to work as he will. And in the meantime, we can do penance, good deeds, and continue to pray. But this should give us some good food for thought, namely how much we must rely on God's grace if we are going to grow in deep prayer and consequently grow in holiness. You see, our holiness and our life of prayer, especially at this point in the spiritual life, is not totally dependent on our efforts, it is dependent on God's providence. What we must do is be humble, for humility disposes us to receive greater graces. She goes on, The second reason is that these interior operations being sweet and peaceful, any painful effort does us more harm than good. By painful effort I mean any forcible restraint we place on ourselves, such as holding our breath. We should rather abandon our souls into the hands of God, leaving him to do as he chooses with us as far as possible for getting all self-interest and resigning ourselves entirely to his will. And so again, we need not to worry, we just need to allow God to work. The third reason Teresa gives is the very care used to think of nothing will excite the mind all the more, and it will cause the brain to think very much. And the fourth is because she says we render God the most true and acceptable service by caring only for his honor and glory, and forgetting ourselves our advantages, comfort and happiness. So what is most essential in pleasing to God is that we be mindful of his honor and glory and just forget about ourselves. When God wants our intellects to stop, he will occupy our intellect in another way and give it an understanding far greater than we can attain on our own. We should just let our faculties do what they were designed by God to do. So without stopping the mind altogether, she says the soul should strive to cut down the rambling of the intellect, and she writes, in my opinion, when God chooses to place the soul in this mansion, it is best for it to do as I advise, and then endeavor without force or disturbance to keep free from wandering thoughts. No effort, however, should be made to suspend the imagination entirely from acting, for it is well to remember God's presence to consider who he is. If transported out of itself by its feelings, well and good. But let it not try to understand what is passing within it, for this favor is bestowed on the will, which should be left to enjoyed in peace, only making loving aspirations occasionally. Although, in this kind of prayer, the soul makes no effort towards it, yet often for a very short time, the mind ceases to think at all. And so again, we cannot allow ourselves to be overly concerned about the operations of our mind. We need to just submit to God's good grace and God's judgment. He'll take care of our mind as we try to do His will and prayer. St. Teresa next returns to discussing divine consolations. And now she wants to look at the effects they have upon a soul. Now remember, the prayer of recollection that we just talked about. This comes before divine consolations, and it's the prayer by which one enters the fourth mansion and enters into divine consolations. So the prayer of recollection is much less intense than divine consolations. Moreover, the prayer of recollection doesn't require us to give up meditating, nor to cease using our intellect, whereas divine consolations, or what we call the prayer of quiet, in that prayer the mind will be forced to seize its action. Now as for the effects of divine consolations, she gives us nine. She says first, expansion or dilation of the soul. Also returning to the analogy of the water, she says that the water rising within this basin, not through conduits or aqueducts, but of its own source, never runs over into a stream, but that the basin is made such that it becomes larger, the more water flows into it. She says that in this way God seems to work the same effect by this prayer, besides giving many other marvelous graces, so preparing and disposing the soul to contain all he intends to give up. A second effect, greater freedom, that we are not constrained by a fear of hell. The third, great confidence in the soul that it will enjoy God. The fourth effect, no fear of austerities and losing its health as before when doing penance. The fifth effect is actually a greater desire for penance. Number six, she says his greater indifference is felt for sufferings, because faith, being stronger, it trusts that if born for God, he will give the grace to endure them patiently. Number seven, she says indeed such a one at times even longs for trials, having a most ardent desire to do something for God's sake. The eighth effect is greater knowledge of God's grandeur that leads to understanding more vividly one's own baseness. And number nine, seeing worldly delights as being vile and withdrawing from them, thus leading to greater self-mastery. Now Saint Teresa cautioned so that while the soul will continue to grow, if it doesn't turn away from God and offend him, it must also be understood that not all of these effects will be given to a soul who receives divine consolations only once or twice from God. The divine consolations have to be received continually because it's on their frequent reception that the whole welfare of the soul depends. She also gives the warning that the devil will fight mightily against souls who are granted these favors. And so she strongly encourages these souls not to turn away from prayer for fear of falling into serious sin. Turn away from prayer, you become the prairie of the devil. Saint Teresa also warns against counterfeit spiritual experiences that can result from long hours of prayer, penance and fasting. Being worn down physically and feeling some interior consolations, some people mistake this for a spiritual experience, but what she says is that these people need to sleep more, eat better and do less penance. As Saint Teresa teaches us, it should be known that when God bestows such favors on the soul, although there may be, languor both of mind and body, it is not shared by the soul, which feels great delight at seeing itself so near God, nor does this state ever continue for more than a very short time. Although the soul may become absorbed again, yet as I said, unless already feeble the body suffers neither exhaustion nor pain. So Saint Teresa has gotten us to a point where the spiritual life really takes off. Having taken us this far, the soul that advances from here will really begin to reach the heights of holiness. What must be remembered is that at this point the soul is relying completely on God for its experiences of prayer. People who reach the stage must continue to persevere in prayer and in a life of virtue. They must maintain a humble disposition, leaving everything to God, and thinking of themselves as worthy of nothing. And that brings us to the end of day nine, our study of the interior castle. Thank you so much for listening and joining me on this journey to grow deeper in your spiritual life. Next time we will begin discussing the fifth mansions. And with that in mind, let's pray together Saint Teresa's prayer. 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. Amen. May God bless you and may Saint Teresa intercede for you. 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