Spiritual Quote of the Day (St. Therese of Lisieux, on Deeds and Love)

“Without love, deeds, even the most brilliant, count as nothing.” —French Carmelite nun—and “Doctor of the Church”—St. Therese of Lisieux (1873-1897), The Thoughts of St. Therese of the Child Jesus (1915)

This Thursday, the feast day of “The Little Flower”—a saint of unsurpassed humility and devotion to God—will be celebrated.

Spiritual Quote of the Day (Jim O’Grady, on Picking a Saint To Help You)

“Maybe you, too, have an unreasonable fear that is leaching the color from your life. Maybe you remedy this through walking, meditation, or therapy. I recommend picking a saint to help you. The ‘saint’ doesn’t have to be a literal, official Catholic one—they can be anyone who rejected a life of maximal self-interest in favor of radical service, someone whose commitment to the rigors and contradictions of doing good in this world can show you how to live in it."—Podcast reporter and biographer Jim O’Grady, “Letter of Recommendation: Saints,” The New York Times Magazine, Sept. 15, 2024

Spiritual Quote of the Day (Dr. Jordan Grumet, on Tyrants Vs. Saints)

“The tyrant seeks to bend the world to their will. They apply power externally to remake the environment, people, or culture around them, often in the belief that if they can just change enough out there, they will finally feel whole inside. Saints, on the other hand, reverse this equation. They focus their power inward—working on themselves, healing their wounds, mastering their habits, refining their values. Ironically, it’s through this inward mastery that they end up changing the world more deeply than any tyrant ever could.”— Dr. Jordan Grumet, “Tyrants vs. Saints: The Power That Changes Everything” (“The Regret-Free Life” blog), Psychology Today, Apr. 15, 2025

The image accompanying this post shows perhaps the epitome of a saint in conflict with a tyrant: left to right, a pensive St. Thomas More and a browbeating King Henry VIII (played by, respectively, Paul Scofield and Robert Shaw) in the 1966 Best Picture Oscar winner, A Man for All Seasons.

The crisis that Henry forced on More is a reminder not only of the heavy burden that public officials face in drawing a moral line that arbitrary rulers cannot cross, but also the responsibility that ordinary individuals must maintain in upholding the primacy of conscience.

Spiritual Quote of the Day (Kurt Vonnegut Jr., on Where You Meet Saints)

“You meet saints everywhere. They can be anywhere. They are people behaving decently in an indecent society.”—American novelist Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (1922-2007), quoted by Harvey Wasserman, “May Peace Be with You, Kurt Vonnegut," Huffington Post, Apr. 13, 2007

Spiritual Quote of the Day (St. Augustine, on the Reward of the Saints)

“Here below [the saints] endure obloquy for the City of God, which is hateful to the lovers of this world. That City is eternal; no one is born there, because no one dies. There is the true felicity, which is no goddess, but the gift of God. From there we have received the pledge of our faith, in that we sigh for her beauty while on our pilgrimage. In that City the sun does not rise ‘on the good and on the evil’; the ‘sun of righteousness’ spreads its light only on the good; there the public treasury needs no great efforts for its enrichment at the cost of private property; for there the common stock is the treasury of truth.”— Theologian, philosopher, and bishop St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430 AD), City of God, translated by Henry Bettenson (1984)

Spiritual Quote of the Day (Eamon Duffy, on Saints)

“The saints are also, importantly, beyond us, visible signs of a call to transcend the ordinariness of our lives, and evidence of the possibility of heroism and wonder.” —Irish church historian Eamon Duffy, Faith of Our Fathers: Reflections on Catholic Tradition (2004)

The photo of Eamon Duffy accompanying this post was taken Apr. 24, 2010, by Fr. James Bradley from Southampton, UK.

Spiritual Quote of the Day (St. Teresa of Avila, on the Pledge of God’s Love)

“Whenever we think of Christ, we should remember the love with which He has bestowed these favours on us, and what great love our Lord God has revealed to us also in giving us this pledge of His love for us, for love calls out love.” —Doctoris Ecclesiae (Doctor of the Church) St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), Spanish nun, mystic and reformer The Life of St. Teresa of Avila by Herself (ca. 1567)

Four centuries ago yesterday, Pope Gregory XV canonized one of the most extraordinary sets of holy people in the long history of the Roman Catholic Church: Isidore the Farmer, Philip Neri, Ignatius Loyola, Francis Xavier, and Teresa of Avila.

Four of these figures were members of religious communities. I am especially fond of the pioneering Jesuits Ignatius and Francis. But among this quintet, the most unusual might be St. Teresa of Avila.

Some 30 years after her canonization, the Baroque sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini finished Ecstasy of St. Teresa. In the portion of that masterpiece I’ve reproduced here, you can fully understand the sense of spiritual transport that this Carmelite saint sought to convey in her autobiography:

"I saw in his hand a long spear of gold, and at the iron's point there seemed to be a little fire. He appeared to me to be thrusting it at times into my heart, and to pierce my very entrails; when he drew it out, he seemed to draw them out also, and to leave me all on fire with a great love of God. The pain was so great, that it made me moan; and yet so surpassing was the sweetness of this excessive pain, that I could not wish to be rid of it. The soul is satisfied now with nothing less than God. The pain is not bodily, but spiritual; though the body has its share in it, even a large one. It is a caressing of love so sweet which now takes place between the soul and God, that I pray God of His goodness to make him experience it who may think that I am lying."

Not surprisingly, that passage demonstrates why the symbols associated with her are a heart, an arrow and a book. Because she also wrote of the migraines she experienced in episodes similar to this, St. Teresa is also the patron saint of migraine sufferers, making her a figure of special interest to those afflicted with chronic pain.

Figures ranging from the American philosopher William James and Catholic radical activist Dorothy Day (now herself being considered for canonization) have been fascinated by both her writing and her life. And no wonder: Among her Carmelite nuns, she promoted a renewed emphasis on detachment, prayer, fasting, self-denial and works of penance, and contemplation during the Counter Reformation.

For her troubles, Teresa was investigated by the Spanish Inquisition. Her canonization, two generations after her death, represented her posthumous victory.

It would take still longer, however, for the full dimensions of her spiritual achievement to be realized. 

In 1970, Pope Paul VI named her the first female Doctor of the Church, a designation that Rome reserves for saints who have significantly contributed to theology or doctrine. Even now, she is among only four females out of 37 of these figures. (The other women in this group are Catherine of Siena, Therese of Lisieux, and Hildegard of Bingen.)

St. Teresa is more than an exemplar of astounding holiness. In its enduring faithfulness, her life represents a standing rebuke to a Church hierarchy where strong vestiges of misogyny linger to this day.

(For an interesting brief consideration of this saint’s views on prayer, I urge you to read Gina Loehr’s October 2018 post on the “Franciscan Spirit” blog.)

Spiritual Quote of the Day (Fr. James Martin, on ‘The Saint as Companion’)

“Traditionally, there are two ways that Christians relate to the saints: as patron and as companion….Christians, especially Catholics, ask for the saint’s help, for his or her prayers in heaven, in the same way that you would ask for a friend’s prayer here on earth…. But the model more prevalent in the early church… was the saint as companion….The saint was seen as our fellow traveler along the way to God; by following his or her example the saint provides us with a model of Christian life.”—James Martin, S.J., My Life with the Saints (2007)

(The image accompanying this post shows Paul Scofield in his Oscar-winning role as St. Thomas More in A Man for All Seasons—a figure who put his career and even his life at stake for the sake of a principle. With all the imperfections of his life--as a man and figure making his way amid the religious and political quarrels of his day--More remains a model of courage over opportunism in his melancholy but determined opposition to his capricious king's whim.)

Spiritual Quote of the Day (St. Augustine of Hippo, on God’s Mercy)

“What mercy could be greater, so far as we poor wretches are concerned, than that which drew the Creator of the heavens down from heaven, clothed the Maker of the earth with earthly vesture, made Him, who in eternity remains equal to His Father, equal to us in mortality, and imposed on the Lord of the universe the form of a servant, so that He, our Bread, might hunger; that He, our Fulfillment, might thirst; that He, our Strength, might be weakened; that He, our Health, might be injured; that He, our Life, might die? And all this [He did] to satisfy our hunger, to moisten our dryness, to soothe our infirmity, to wipe out our iniquity, to enkindle our charity. What greater mercy could there be than that the Creator be created, the Ruler be served, the Redeemer be sold, the Exalted be humbled and the Reviver be killed?” — Theologian, philosopher, and bishop St. Augustine of Hippo (354 AD-430 AD), The Fathers of the Church: St. Augustine: Sermons on the Liturgical Seasons, Volume 38, Sermon 207, translated by Sister Mary Sarah Muldowney (1959)

Photo of the Day: Stained-Glass Window, Irish Room, Cathedral of Learning, Pittsburgh (PA)

As promised in a prior post, I am now going to explore various rooms that (at least before the COVID-19 outbreak) are open to visitors at the Cathedral of Learning, an architectural marvel located on the University of Pittsburgh campus. 

Though the exterior of the building (which is, incidentally, on the National Register of Historic Places) is impressive, its interiors—especially the Nationality Rooms, intended to honor early ethnic groups in the area--are small gems unto themselves. 

The image I’ve attached is from the Irish Room—which, considering my ancestry, is a natural. Stained-glass windows, with their emphasis on storytelling, particularly appeal to me. 

What you see here is one of three scenes depicting famous teachers at the three oldest centers of learning in Ireland: St. Finnian at Clonard, “the Master of the Saints of Ireland.” (The other two windows show St. Columkille at Derry and St. Carthagh at Lismore.)

Spiritual Quote of the Day (St. Thomas of Villanova, on Humility, ‘Mother of Many Virtues’)

“Humility is the mother of many virtues. From it spring obedience, holy fear, reverence, patience, modesty, mildness and peace; for whoever is humble easily obeys everyone, fears to offend anyone, maintains peace with all, shows himself affable to all, is submissive to all, does not offend or displease any, and does not feel the insults which may be afflicted upon him. He is happy and contented, and in great peace.”—Spanish Augustinian friar, preacher, religious writer, archbishop, and “Father of the Poor” St. Thomas of Villanova (1488-1555), quoted in A Year With the Saints,

translated from the Italian by a member of the Order of Mercy, Mt. St. Joseph's Seminary, Hartford, Conn. (1891)

The image accompanying this post is Santo Tomas de Villanueva, by Spanish painter Francisco Camilo (1615-1671).