Groaning

Homily for the Parish Celebration of Vespers for the Solemnity of Saint Teresa of Avila
15 October 2014

        We all know what it is to groan.

        We groan when we’re tired. We groan when we are sick. We groan when we stand up. We groan when we sit down. We groan in anger. We groan in frustration. We groan at the telling of a bad joke.

        We groan when we have nothing left to say.

        We groan when we don’t know what to say.

        And here we find ourselves celebrating a woman who had a lot to say, and we recognize that throughout the course of her life, she groaned.

        But Saint Teresa, this first woman Doctor of the Church, teaches us more than to groan because of frustration, sickness or the occasional bad joke. She instructs us on how to groan through and with the Spirit.

        The groaning of our hearts – the way that the Spirit stirs us to speak and to act – is the manifestation of the groaning of God to wake us from our sleep to the newness of life; it is the way in which our God calls us from a life of hopelessness to a life that is filled with hope. The groaning of our hearts to the Heart of God is that groaning of two lovers, whose expressions of love go beyond glances and actions, who speak only in the groanings of ecstasy.

        And this is what our prayer is to be: Moments when our hearts and the Heart of God join in ecstasy, groaning because words we would use are not needed or not to be found. This is what Saint Teresa teaches us, because it is what she, herself, experienced in her life.

        In his summary of his examination of the life of Saint Teresa, Pope-Emeritus Benedict XVI says the following:

Dear brothers and sisters, Saint Teresa of Jesus is a true teacher of Christian life for the faithful of every time. In our society, which all too often lacks spiritual values, Saint Teresa teaches us to be unflagging witnesses of God, of His presence and of His action. She teaches us truly to feel this thirst for God that exists in the depths of our hearts, this desire to see God, to seek God, to be in conversation with Him and to be His friends.

       

        Our life lived in the here and now needs to be full of the moments when our thirst for God is expressed in our inexpressible groaning through the Holy Spirit. We seek Him with our faith and reason. We see Him through grace-filled moments, especially when carrying out the Corporal or Spiritual Works of Mercy. We are ceaselessly in conversation with Him not only through our participation in the liturgies of the Church, but also as we surrender our lives to His will, as we submit our will to His Divine Plan.

        Saint Teresa knew the ecstasy of union with the Divine; she also knew of the painful limitations of human existence. And whether experiencing either end of the extremes, or simply being stuck in the middle, she knew that her groanings were never futile, never left unanswered, for her groanings were groanings rooted in the Holy Spirit, inexpressible expressions of her desire to always be united with God.

        This is how her teachings are timeless.

        Let us take a moment and reflect upon some of her words of instruction and intellect:

O my God, what must a soul be like when it is in this state! It longs to be all one tongue with which to praise the Lord. It utters a thousand pious follies, in a continuous endeavor to please Him who thus possesses it.

The devil will try to upset you by accusing you of being unworthy of the blessings that you have received. Simply remain cheerful and do your best to ignore the devil's nagging. If need be even laugh at the absurdity of the situation. Satan, the epitome of sin itself, accuses you of unworthiness! When the devil reminds you of your past, remind him of his future!

For prayer is nothing else than being on terms of friendship with God.

I am asking you only to look at Him. For who can prevent you from turning the eyes of your soul upon this Lord? You are capable of looking at very ugly and loathsome things: can you not, then, look at the most beautiful thing imaginable? 

 

        My brothers and sisters, we have entered into the eternal groaning of our hearts this evening, seeking the Lord, recognizing His presence in our midst. We have turned our gaze to Him who is the most beautiful thing imaginable. We have entered into our prayer as friends of God. We laugh at the absurdity of Satan’s lies. We do all this through the praise of our God.

        Saint Teresa ultimately teaches us one thing tonight: Do not be afraid of the groanings of our soul. They are that crying out of our souls to the Lord; they are our inexpressible expressions seeking the ecstasy found in the union of the Loved and the Beloved. Don’t be afraid, then, to allow your soul to groan, for the Spirit groans within us to awaken us to the ecstasy that awaits us – in this life and in the next. It is in the reckless abandon of our hearts to God’s that we testify and witness to the world – through our groaning – that “God alone suffices.”

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Enjoy the journey . . .