Carmelites

St Edith Stein’s spiritual journey begins at birth. St. Edith Stein, also referred to as Teresa Benedicta, was born in 1891 as the youngest member of a Jewish family living in Breslau, Poland. The fact she was the youngest of eleven children as well as her birthday falling on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, contributed to Edith quickly becoming her mother’s favorite child. Edith and her mother became very close, her mother supporting Edith’s academic quests and encouraging…

How does slavery in Brazil compare to slavery in America? First, where they got their slaves and when it started. Second, there is the population rate of their slaves. Third, is how Brazilian and American slavery were similar. Fourth, is the way they treated their slaves. In Brazil, slave labor was long before the settlement of Jamestown and still had hordes of slaves on its plantations as late as a quarter century, even after the U.S. had issued the Emancipation Proclamation. The slave trade…

angel supposedly visited a monk to offer angelica as the cure for a plague. Another story is that angelica got its name because its blooming season roughly coincides with the feast day of the archangel Michael. The herb was an ingredient in the Carmelite water used to ward off witches and spells during the medieval period. Angelica was also used during the London Black Plague outbreak in 1665. It was included along with nutmeg and treacle as a supposed cure formulated by the College of…

I always knew my neighbor Margaret was an interesting character, she lives in a beautiful house that she built with her husband. She has moved around the country a lot, and always has interesting accounts and stories to tell. When deciding on who to interview, she seemed like a perfect candidate, a politically savvy elderly lady who has an particularly unique and interesting view on things. Originally I was going to base my interview around the Vietnam war era, so around the sixties. I was going…

In many different religious texts, there are many similarities and difference; if you closely examine each of the texts. The same is true of both the Bhagavad Gita and The Raptures of St. Teresa. While examining these two texts, it is obvious that the experiences that were described were both religious and instructional. In the case of Teresa, she goes on and on about the vision that God grants her and how they have helped to shape her life. “These refer to all visions [of life].” The simple and…

and which in my dream represented the “nucleus of the atom.” This nucleus later took on a metaphysical sense; I considered it ‘the very unity of the universe, ‘the Christ! In the second place, when, thanks to the instructions of Father Bruno, a Carmelite, I saw the Christ drawn by Saint John of the Cross. I worked out geometrically a triangle and a circle that aesthetically summarized all my previous experiments, and I inscribed Christ in the triangle.” (Frisch, Patricia 2) Whereas, Paranoia (3)…

Introduction Teresa of Avila (1515-1582) is one of the most beloved spiritual figures in history. Therefore, she was born on March 28, 1515 at crown castle which is today’s Spain. Like Francis of Assisi, she is known around the world as a great mystic, saint, and reformer. This refreshing and thoughtful biography captures the compelling combination of down-to earth humanity and profound, enriching spirituality that Teresa’s hall mark. She held unconventional, progressive views on prayer and…

Kathryn Burns Colonial Habits talks about the roles played by three convents, the Santa Clara, the Santa Catalina and the Carmelite Santa Teresa as they helped with the economic and social life of Cuzco from the mid-sixteenth century through to the nineteenth century. Burns’ sources were primarily from the convents' own archives and she talks about how the ties between the convents and local elite families allowed the nuns to play an important role in Cuzco’s economic development. The convents…

Ever since Pope Francis made his reveal in major cities in the U.S. a lot of criticism has arisen surrounding his actions in the air of this “holy” experience for any of those who attended. The topic Pope Francis intermixed with same-sex marriage and the now overly-publicized clerk, Kim Davis has led to some lost hope in the Pope’s sense of tolerance and hope for change despite his devotion to the church and the values it holds. Kim Davis is a now well-known, not in the best terms, for her…

Masterpieces are not famous because of the talented artists that produced them, but because they are produced with a unique alternative perspective. These paintings have some characteristics that sets them apart from the ordinary, because after a long period of time they continue to resonate with people, such as myself, in modern time. One such example of an extraordinary unique piece of art is the painting, Torment of Saint Anthony painted by Giovanni Girolamo Savoldo. “combining an intense…