Saint Teresa of Avila continues to fascinate and inspire people around the world, even 500 years after her birth. The books of this Spanish Carmelite nun – such as The Way of Perfection and The Interior Castle - are widely acknowiedged as classics of the Christian mystical tradition.
However, Teresa also wrote hundreds of letters, which give us an immediate impressron of her passion, humanity, temperament, humour, determination, and her closeness to God. Teresa's style of writing is direct and immediate. By expressing her joys and sorrows Teresa helps us to see that being human is to be flawed and fallible, but this does not preciude us from pursuing, and in some measure attaining, the way of perfection.
In this insightful and engaging book, Sheila Grimwood explores Teresa's correspondence to help us appreciate the Carmelite reformer and innovator as a real woman with important things to say to our age as well as her own.