Teresa of Avila & Bernini

In January 1647, Bernini agreed to design and build a chapel for the eminent Cardinal Federico

Cornaro.  The Chapel was to be in honor of both Cornaro’s illustrious family and one of his favorite saints, the recently canonized (1622) Spanish Carmelite nun and mystic, Teresa of Avila.

Bernini, His Life and His Rome by Franco Mormando p. 159

Teresa (1515-1582), after completing her education, initially resisted the idea of a religious vocation, but after a stay with her uncle and other relatives, she relented. In 1536 aged 18, much to the disappointment of her pious and austere father, (her Mother was Catholic) she decided to enter the local easy-going Carmelite Convent of the Incarnation, significantly built on top of land that had been used previously as a burial ground for Jews. Teresa was a Spanish noblewoman with Jewish roots who chose a monastic life in the Roman Catholic church.

She took up religious reading on contemplative prayer, especially Osuna’s Third Spiritual Alphabet (1527). Her zeal for mortification caused her to become ill and she spent almost a year in bed. She nearly died but, she recovered thanks to the miraculous intercession of St. Joseph, she believed. She began to experience instances of religious ecstasy which often included levitation.

Active during the Counter-Reformation, she reformed the Carmelite Orders of both women and men. The movement she initiated was later joined by the younger Spanish Carmelite friar and mystic, Saint John of the Cross. It led eventually to the establishment of the Discalced Carmelites. A formal papal decree adopting the split was issued in 1580.

Her final illness overtook her on one of her journeys from Burgos to Alba de Tormes. Her last words were: “My Lord, it is time to move on. Well then, may your will be done. O my Lord and my Spouse, the hour that I have longed for has come. It is time to meet one another.

Watch a small video about Teresa of Avila’s life.