Lectio et Oratio

Episode 7 - Second Mansions 1.1 - Interior Castle, St Teresa of Avila 18.12.2025 24:15 ↓

The second mansions describe our beginning to live a devout life. What happens when we decide to live a more regular life of prayer? What happens when we first want to make up for our old way of life? The devil throws up all kinds of obstacles. The world objects. Our own fallen nature causes troubles. This section is a great exhortation to perseverance. 

Episode 6 - First Mansions 2.4 - Interior Castle, St Teresa of Avila 06.12.2025 17:30 ↓

St Teresa specifies that the mansions have many rooms. She gives very concrete advice on how to avoid the tricks of the devil in the rooms of this first mansion. She especially explains how the devil loves to cause a cooling of charity in communities by having people focus on things that are not really their concern, especially the perceived faults of others. Powerful warning about the value of ch...

Episode 5 - First Mansions 2.3 - Interior Castle, St Teresa of Avila 02.12.2025 16:23 ↓

St Teresa describes the need for self-knowledge. But where do we gain self-knowledge? From examining our own lives and our inclinations? Yes. But we must gain self-knowledge as well by looking at the Son of God. He reveals God to us. He also reveals man to himself. 

Episode 4 - First Mansions 2.2 - Interior Castle, St Teresa of Avila 02.12.2025 9:50 ↓

Continues question of mortal sin. Let us pray each day to be free from this kind of sin. Explains why she is even talking about mortal sin at all. This is a call to humility, a call to recognize that more is happening in our prayer than we realize. Her focus in this book will be on what God is doing in our prayer.

Episode 3 - First Mansions 2.1 - Interior Castle, St Teresa of Avila 02.12.2025 12:09 ↓

How does mortal sin relate to the image of the soul as a crystal? If God is at the centre of the soul, grace is the light that fills the soul. Mortal sin is like the soul being covered with a black cloth. Such sin causes the radiation of God's life (grace) to cease. Wonderful image of grace, the radiation of God's love in our souls that makes us bright and beautiful. 

Episode 2 - First Mansions 1.1 - Interior Castle, St Teresa of Avila 02.12.2025 20:52 ↓

How do we enter the interior castle? The interior castle is the soul itself.  We have to enter into ourselves. We are seeking the One who dwells at the centre of the soul. We seek Our Lord in our souls by prayer, by paying attention to the One inside ourselves and his activities. But how did St Teresa gain this insight to see the soul as a crystal mansion with many mansions? God gave her this gift...

Episode 1 -- Introduction -- Interior Castle, St Teresa of Avila 02.12.2025 13:36 ↓

Did St Teresa want to write this book on prayer? No. She felt great repugnance both by a sense of her lack of ability and her constant headaches. But she trusted in God to help her. If she was being commanded by the Church to write this book, she would trust God to teach her what to say. She began on the Solemnity of the Holy Trinity. This book is written after St Teresa had vast experience of pra...