From the Writings of St Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein)

On this feast day of St Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, I thought I'd simply put forth some of her own words for reflection. I have highlighted in bold the phrases that have particular meaning for me.

 

 

Natural love seeks to possess the beloved entirely and as far as possible not to share him. Christ came to win back lost mankind for the Father: whoever loves with his love will want people for God and not for himself. Of course, that is the surest way to possess them forever; for wherever we have entrusted a person to God, then we are one with him in God.

     -- from The Mystery of Christmas, trans. from German by Josephine Rucker

Because being one wth Christ is our sanctity, and progressively becoming one with him our happiness on earth, the love of the cross in no way contradicts being a joyful child of God. Helping Christ carry his cross fills one with a strong and pure joy, and those who may and can do so, the builders of God's kingdom, are the most authentic children of God. And so those who have a predilection for the way of the cross by no means deny that Good Friday is past and that the work of salvation has been accomplished. Only those who are saved, only children of grace, can in fact be bearers of Christ's cross. Only in union with the divine Head does human suffering take on expiatory power. To suffer and to be happy although suffering, to have one's feet on the earth, to walk on the dirty and rough paths of this earth and yet to be enthroned with Christ at the Father's right hand, to laugh and cry with the children of this world and ceaselessly to sing the praises of God with the choirs of angels, this is the life of the Christian until the morning of eternity breaks forth.

     -- from The Hidden Life, trans. Waltraud Stein

The only essential is that one finds, first of all, a quiet corner in which one can communicate with God as though there were nothing else, and that must be done daily. It seems to me the best time is in the early morning hours before we begin our daily work [....] My life begins anew each morning, and ends every evening; I have neither plans nor prospects beyond it: i.e., to plan ahead could obviously be part of one's daily duties -- teaching school, for example, could be impossible without that -- but it must never turn into a "worry" about the coming day.

     -- from a letter to Sister Callista, trans. Josephine Koeppel

God is truth. All who seek truth seek God, whether this is clear to them or not.
     -- from a letter to Sister Adelgundis, trans. Josephine Koeppel