Letter 252. To Father Pablo Hernandez, S.J.. Madrid, A Vila, October 4, 1578

Trials of the Reform and of Father Gracian. Petition for help in respeB of the Royal Council and the Nuncio.

JESUS!

May the grace of the Holy Spirit be with you, my Father.

A WEEK ago, I received a letter from Ana de los Angeles, Prioress of Medina, telling me that you were at Madrid. The news was a great comfort to me, for I believe that God has led you there in order to relieve me of some of my trials. Since August last year they have been so numerous and so varied that it would be an intense relief to me if you visited me so that I could tell you about some of them, though to relate them all would be impossible. They culminate in our present position, which will be described to you by the bearer of this letter, whose affection for us makes him share our sorrows, and whom we can trust implicitly.

The devil cannot endure the fervour with which these Discalced friars and nuns serve our Lord. T assure your Reverence that the perfection of their lives would console you. There are nine houses of friars containing many excellent religious, but as we do not form a separate province no pen could describe the annoyances and sufferings inflidled on them by those of the cloth.' At present our Father, whether for good or evil is, under God, in the hands of the Nuncio; and, for our sins the Mitigated have brought charges against us, in which the Nuncio places entire credit, so that I do not know how affairs will end. They say that I am a gad-about, restless woman, who founded convents without licence either from Pope or General. Let your Reverence consider whether anything could have been more unruly or unchristian on my part. Many other accusations unfit to be mentioned, are brought by these blessed friars against me and Father Gracian, who was their Visitor. Such unbearable calumnies are deplorable, for I certify to your Reverence that no one I have met serves God more truly with an upright, pure conscience than he does. You may trust my word for this. As perhaps you are aware, he has been trained by the Society all his life. The whole matter took its rise at Alcala. The Nuncio is exceedingly angry with him for reasons concerning which, were the truth known. Father Gracian would be found to be little if at all to blame. I, too, am in disgrace with the Nuncio, although I have done nothing against his authority; indeed, I willingly obeyed a Brief which he sent here, and wrote him the most humble letter possible.

I believe that all this trouble is sent from heaven, that God wills us to suffer and that no one should defend the truth or say a good word for me. I declare sincerely to you that I feel neither trouble nor pain regarding what affedts me personally: indeed, it affords me special pleasure, though if it were proved that these fathers' charges against me were false, perhaps the Nuncio would not believe what they allege against our Father Gracian, which is the important matter for us. I therefore send you a copy of the patents of authorization which I hold, as the Nuncio declares that our acfls are invalid on the ground that we have founded houses without licence. As I perceive that the devil is doing all in his power to discredit these convents, I desire that God's servants should come forward to defend them. O my Father, how few friends we have in time of need!

They tell me that you are a great favourite of the President and that you are now in Madrid on his account. I believe that the Nuncio has given him his own version of what I have told you, and more as well. Your Reverence would do us great service by undeceiving the President, which you could do as an eye-witness, as indeed you are of my soul. I believe it would be rendering great service to our Lord. Will you explain to the President how important it is that the new-born Reform should flourish, for you know how lax our sacred Order had become.

People declare that the Reform is a new Order freshly Invented. Let them read our primitive Rule: all we do is to observe it without mitigation in all the rigour in which the Pope first authorized it. Let them believe only what they see, and examine our lives and those of the Calced, instead of listening to what the latter say, for I do not know where the Mitigated got the many falsehoods with which they attack us. I also beg your Reverence to speak on my behalf to the Nuncio's confessor,' to remember me to him, and tell him the whole truth, asking him to lay it on the Nuncio's conscience not to publish such charges against us until he has investigated them. Say that, though I am extremely wicked, I should not dare to commit the adlions of which they accuse me. I ask you to do this if you think it expedient; not otherwise.

If vour Reverence approves, you might also show the Nuncio the patents by which I founded, one of which contains a formal precept not to cease making foundations. When I asked our Father General not to make me establish any more convents, he wrote in reply that he wished me to found as many houses as I had hairs on my head. It is not right that so many nuns who serve God devoutly should be discredited by such accusations. Since, as I said, it is you of the Society who trained me and gave me being, it seems to me right that you should declare the truth, so that such a grave personage as the Nuncio, who has come to reform our religious Orders and is not liimself a native of Spain, should learn who ought to be reformed and who ought to be taken into favour, and should punish the persons who have told him such falsehoods.

Your Reverence will know what is best to be done. I ask of you for the love of our Lord and His precious Mother that as you have helped us ever since you knew us, you will do so now in our dire need. They will repay you generously, and your Reverence owes it to me for my good-will towards you and in defence of the truth, which you will make known in the way you see best.

I beg your Reverence to keep me informed of everything, especially about your health. Mine has been very poor, for our Lord has tried me in every way this year, but I care little for myself. What troubles me is to see that these servants of God are suffering for my sins. May His Majesty be with your Reverence and protecfl you! Kindly let me know whether the report is true that you are to make a long stay in Madrid.

To-day is the feast of St. Francis.

The unworthy and loyal daughter of your Reverence,

Teresa de Jesus, Carmelite.

CCLI

Prefatory note.

While Juan Jesus de Roca was in retirement at Madrid he wrote frequently to Sega, begging to be heard in defence of the Discalced. At last the Nuncio visited him at the priory and Fray Juan pleaded for the Reform and its foundress. At the name of St. Teresa, Sega exclaimed angrily: 'Do not mention her name! She is a restless, gad-about, disobedient, contumacious woman who promulgates pernicious doctrine under the pretence of devotion. She leaves her cloister against the orders of her superiors and the decrees of the Council of Trent. She is ambitious and teaches theology as though she were a doctor of the Church in spite of St. Paul's prohibition.' The rock of bronze' defended the Saint against each charge and convinced the Nuncio of her innocence. He then begged that the Discalced might be constituted as a separate province as the Caked would not govern them according to their Rule and wished to suppress them. ' 1 give you my word not to subject you to the Mitigated,' answered Sega: Write to all your communities telling them to apply to me for what they want, for I myself will govern you in future.' (Reforma bk. iv, ch. xxviii, XXX. 2. Found. XXVIII, note 9.) This was probably the occasion on which he liberated Fathers Gracian, Mariano and Antonio.

Unhappily the Nuncio's favourable state of mind was soon changed to anger and indignation. The Apostolic Visitors had decreed that when their term of office had expired the members of the Reform might meet in Chapter and elect a Provincial of there own. Relying on this, Fray Antonio de Jesus, who in the Chapter held at Almodovar 1576 had been made first Definitor and appointed vice-gerent of Father Gracian in case of the latter's absence or revocation, summoned the Discalced priors and their socii to a Chapter to be held at Almodovar on October 7, 1578. Here Fray Antonio was elected Provincial, which was considered both by the friends and enemies of the Reform as equivalent to constituting it as a separate province. Besides this, friars were appointed as messengers to the Holy See to negotiate the affairs of the Discalced. Saint John of the Cross went to the Chapter and did all that he could to persuade his brethren against taking such a course. Before the Chapter was dissolved. Fray Juan de Jesus Roca arrived from Madrid and vehemently urged the wrongfulness of the act. He told his brethren that they could not plead the decree of

so incensed the king and his Council that, without waiting for an answer to their appeal to Rome, he sent a royal provision to all the Discalced nuns and friars commanding them not to obey the Nuncio as he had not shown the powers that enabled him to interfere with the religious houses of Spain.

Meanwhile, the Nuncio excommunicated the fathers who had taken part in the Chapter and sent St. Teresa back to Toledo, bidding her remain enclosed there. Fray Antonio was imprisoned at la Roda; Mariano was detained first at Atocha and then, as that place was near Madrid and it was thought that he might influence the king, of whom he was a favourite, he was removed to Pastrana. Fray Antonio and Fray Gabriel de la Assuncion were relegated to the Franciscan priory of Madrid. Father Gracian, after having been confined in the Calced Carmelite priory in Madrid was sent to the Discalced priory of Alcala de Henares. The Reform was forbidden to admit novices and its ruin seemed inevitable.

Two friars chosen by the Chapter of Almodovar were sent to Rome on the affairs of the Discalced: Fray Juan de San Diego, prior of the house of Mount Calvary, and Fray Pedro de los Angeles. The latter was distinguished for his austerity. 'You are going to Rome barefoot but you will come back shod,' St. John of the Cross told him. The prophecy was fulfilled. At Naples, on his way to Rome, Fray Pedro met the Vicar General CafFardi and delivered the documents to him instead of placing them in the hands of the authorities at Rome. They were never returned. Enervated by the luxury he enjoyed during his stay at the palace of the viceroy at Naples, Fray Pedro left the Reform for the Mitigation. On his return to Spain, he sold his white mantle at Granada, where it was bought by the Venerable Anne of Jesus, who sent him a message that he must look to his soul, for he would soon die. She refused his repeated requests for an interview, but one day, seeing the door of the convent chapel open, he went in to pray and was struck with such remorse that he wept himself blind and died three days afterwards, about three years after his return from Italy. The only result of his mission was to defer the necessary steps being taken for the Reform.