Blog 1


Most people have an inadequate knowledge of Saint Ignatius. There is a "deformation" of his person. Many conceive and say that Saint Ignatius is more military than a saint. Also, that he interested obedience as a barracks, the outer composure, discipline, which has nothing of the romanticism of a St. Francis of Assisi, the sweetness of a Saint Francis of Sales, innocence and simplicity of a Saint Theresa of Little Jesus. However, it is a false image of him. He was a lover of nature which he saw the hand of the Creator. It was so nice in the treatment everyone liked to talk to him; It was so straightforward and humble when his fellows at the Foundation for the "Society of Jesus." The Jesuits chose him as their first Superior General, and he refused three times. At the persistence of his peers in selecting him for unanimously, he said that he could only accept after his confessor heard his general confession of his whole life, and if he sent him. He was a terribly tender saint to the point of celebrating Mass flooded with tears, and so many other unknown features of his life that make him a fascinating human being and a man of God.

His love for God and everything that refers to piety and devotion was in him highlighted. His great devotion to the Virgin to whom he called her " My Lady." Since his conversion made the Lady of his dreams and loves. He had an intense life of prayers. He prayed for seven hours daily and also he had his recollection and silence daily. His Masses were the center of his entire day. Even he taught the Mass is the center and summit of the life Christian before then the Second Vatican Council told it. Loyola celebrated his masses soaked in tears and very abundant mystical graces he received there. Before he celebrated the mass, he read and meditate the readings and remained held after at least one hour in thanksgiving. In every Mass, he felt the presence of the Holy Trinity a vivid way and often he left powerless.

His penance at the beginning of his conversion was exaggerated penances because he wanted to repair his lost time days without eating or drinking, going hot or cold, and barefoot. He macerated his body with all kinds of austerities. He suffered all his life from terrible stomach pains. When he died, an autopsy was done to see the cause of such pain and was discovered stones, which some think in those early years, he could have swallowed something perpetually to suffer for Jesus. He had a big spirit of poverty, and he wished to have only God for help. He required all his children a care in the use of things end and never accepted the slightest appearance of luxury or superfluity. His Exquisite purity and no woman ever said she saw some attitude less well, and that in Rome he built the house of "Santa Marta" to rescue fallen women. Loyola, himself looked for, convinced and took them to the house attended by religious. A prelate once he said that the house could solve nothing because these women told very easily they return to their bad life. To which Loyola stated that he was well paid for all efforts so that one of those unfortunate not offend the Lord even one night.His admirable prudence handled all obligations of the Company with a solvency unparalleled insight and lucidity. He always looked for the short or the long run, that his decisions were very wise.

There was not a charity which he did not practice in because he practiced all the works of mercy with overwhelming zeal. Therefore, it seems that his preference was to care for the sick, who, despite being the General Superior of the Company and having so many occupations, He never performed to stop. His spirit of a child was simplicity and affability and was so remarkable that all wanted to talk and be with him, so they called him the seductive. His unshakable strength in what looked to be the Will of God there was no one he could dissuade or problem that was put forward was for him insoluble. If it was God's will, no matter what costs have to carry it out. He had an iron will and a heroic perseverance.His apostolic zeal was overwhelming that urged him to do whatever he could just to save one soul.

Blog 2 Review of the Interior Castle 

St. Teresa writes about herself, and from the experience of being and knowing infinitely loved by the Lord. From the approach to the author, it is discovered that her work Interior Castle is herself delivered to recipients the last link in the process of self-communication and final word. Thus was born one of the top rankings books of spirituality in the world. She wrote the book between June 2 and November 29, 1577, with significant interruptions; it is written in a very short time -3 months approximately- between surprises, travel, fears and the wisdom of life. At this period also experiencing one of the most difficult times in her entire life.

Teresa discerned and wrote most significant of her experience of Christ, the Trinity, ecclesiology and the mystery of the human being.
An architectural symbol systematizes the new writing: the castle, giving it cohesion and depth structure. With this, it encodes data of high theological value regarding your spiritual journey that will serve to support a doctrinal synthesis. She called the book "Treaty", and it has great thematic content and pursues the combination of three elements: the author herself, the gospel and a symbol; that is, her personal history, reading from the Word of God and concentrated on the symbol of the castle. She sank the knowledge of life in which man lives in the castle himself and says the theological reason for the mystical life.

Also, the book is about God's action, creation, salvation, and planning. Interior Castle is the divine biography, not about anything but what is He, and in the light of God the man is; in Christ, the full human being toward which we move is revealed. The essential doctrinal elements are God and man, and the relationship of customization that is reached in the encounter. The book is structured on seven mansions: the ascetic, from the first to the third dwelling; the break and step, the fourth abode; and the mystical, from the fifth to the seventh abode. The idea or concept of dwelling refers to the stage where the relationship is; is the action of God and human response. The distinction is important. Finally, the content of the mystique of its wrapper, as interested discern the grace of the clothes in which comes wrapped. The first readers of the Interior Castle are the Carmelites, although the project was the first thing they saw the "letrados." The first theologian who issues a verdict on the final work is the Jesuit Rodrigo Alvarez.

It has been seen that Teresa was communicated herself in her work, and revealed political axes that enable the development of an anthropological proposal. The systematization of their implicit theological understanding of the Interior Castle will make through listening to the author, investigating how she responds to the mystery of the human being. To this end, a method that is essentially centered on a reading text is used. The Teresian approach to writing is made from the detailed study of the terms and taking into account the symbology, which helps understanding of anthropological concepts and allows the tripartite structure of his theological, anthropology, assuming the rich meaning of fear.

The human longing for full humanization interweaves with the draft deification by God, so that befalls a reciprocal search: God from within man illuminates all the dwellings for human advance to the depths of itself, where he dwells. The study does not cover all the Teresian thought; rather it is limited to the scope of a question through a hypothesis in the key work: Interior Castle, born in existential and vital context decanting their maturation process work. In its theological thought, which she calls "mystical theology" it is the hermeneutical key for communication of experience. The humility style of its works has been extensive and ardently discussed. Teresian anthropology discovered mainly analyzing the idea that the author has of itself. This is the Teresian called Socratic: one does not know itself rather than in the light of God. On the one hand, Teresa values the reason is very cerebral and does not advance its reflection not well understood herself. In the field of love, she has always lived very dear: it is an emotional woman who reaches the end and speaks through the term horror. Teresian breaks theological vision and formulas from the spirit, key opening to transcendence where his prophecy is fullness. 

Sources: https://www.ewtn.com/library/SPIRIT/CASTLE.TXT



Blog 3 Another view of the Reformation

We speak of the Reformation, but usually this term we mean about the Protestant Reformation, yet the term reform can include both the Protestant movement and the internal reform of the Catholic Church. For hundreds of years ago, Catholic efforts to reform the Church were called the "Counter" but some scholars objected to the term based on the explanation that the Catholic reform was reduced to a mere response to Protestantism. Many experts argued that the XVI century was a period of several reform efforts, Protestantism being only one of them, there were Catholics efforts meant more to respond to Protestantism and cut its criticism.


Needless to say, the issue of terminology has not been officially established by specialists, since it 's hard to establish something officially among academics. The Catholic Reformation is probably the dominant expression, although the Counter persists in some circles. The following pattern is used to use one or another term for areas where the Catholic reform was not a direct response to Protestantism; the Catholic Reformation term is used, but if such reforms were in direct response then the term is used (re-reform). It is simple, but not always helpful as it is not clear in all cases the direction of reforms.

In any case, the point is what was done in the Catholic Counter- Reformation or not how we call it. Also, what was done? In one hand, restricted the detrimental impact of the Protestant Reformation, limiting the scope of those things that needed to be reformed and limited the scope of the issues that Protestants could influence a non-Catholic direction. Even above the weak Renaissance popes, Catholic saints emerged, calling Catholics to repent and forming for them a life of holiness, without them, things would have been worse. On the other hand, the Catholic Reformation attended the Church to recover much of what was lost by the initial successes of the Protestant Reformation.

Who were the prominent figures of the Catholic Reformation? Some of them were St. Pius V, St. Charles Borromeo, the martyrs Thomas More, and John Fisher contributed to the beginning of the Catholic Reformation. Saint Ignatius and the Jesuits were great instruments of the Catholic renewal and the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius, a concise but spiritually powerful work. Mystics  spiritual giants like Theresa of Avila, John of the Cross, Saint Phili Neri, St. Peter Canisius and St. Francis de Sales, whose pastoral work deeply penetrated the Catholic laity. These saints helped the Catholic Church and society, but their real job was the transformation of hearts and minds. They called people to return to God, to unite with Jesus Christ and live according to the Gospel in their daily lives, and it has been said that medieval Christianity was monastic and denying the world. Almost in a Manichean sense, what can be said in defense to this charge is that it is not entirely accurate because the Christianity of the Middle Ages created in the Christian culture monasteries both within and outside them. Therefore, a false accusation to the Catholic Reformation; no aspect of daily life, whether of the clergy or the laity, was alien to the spiritual revolution of the Catholic Reformation. Consequently, as the division of Europe into Catholics and Protestants had been accomplished by the time of the Catholic Reformation, spiritual vitality of Catholic renewal gained a lot of people back to full communion with the Catholic Church. In our days, we can see that everything that the Catholic Church has passed through, it has been God's will.