Loving
From the chapter about the spiritual background of Sr. Teresia van Miert, it appears that the word love has a special meaning to her. With this, she follows completely the tradition of Johanna of Jesus and Mother Joseph. However, Love is the core of the spirituality of both women. The way they point to others is a path to be trodden in mutual love, as a response to God’s gift of love.
In her letters to Bishops Zwijsen and Godschalk, she wrote regularly about the spirit of love and harmony that she and her Sisters strived after. The mutual love apparently is of great importance to her. We come across this pair of words mutual love very often especially in her letters with the Staten. Particularly in 1886 and 1890, Teresia devoted her whole writing to this subject and she went deeper in to it.
Love and Harmony
In her letter with the statistic overview of the year 1877, Teresia wrote to the Sisters: if you want to live happily in the Congregation, take care then that you are blind, dumb, and deaf to the shortcomings of your co-sisters.
This blindness consists in not minding the action of others, not paying attention to their defects, and not to be concerned about what they think, say or do, you are not to meddle in their business, only insofar as it is your duty, the love or obedience that is required of you. Keep further the silence of not speaking ill of others, neither discussing uncharitable talks. Abstain also from words which could annoy your co-Sisters; love asks this of you. Live in peace and harmony with everybody; this is for your own sake, while you need one another’s help and are dependent on one another. Make yourself deaf and never lend an ear to conversations that are contrary to the reverence and esteem due your Superiors and with the love you owe your co-Sisters.
In the letter with the Staat of 1882, she once more elaborated on being deaf to backbiting, among others, in favor of a sweet and pleasant life.
It appears from the above-mentioned words of Teresia that she attaches a great value to living in harmony with one another. She considers the word harmony and unity of paramount importance. This is not so surprising within an expanding Congregation. The filial houses increased in number through which charitable works continually become extensive.
On September 11, 1852, Teresia was elected as General Superior for the third time. She noted this down in the Register, that the expansion of the Congregation brought about many difficulties. She found her work as a General Superior heavy; the task became more burdensome. The responsibility for an ever-growing organization was placed on her shoulders. It was her task to preserve the unity and harmony within the Congregation.
Still it appears in her letter with the 1877 Staat that Teresia dealt with this more than just keeping the superficial peace. She ended her writing with a blessing prayer wherein she speaks of the “true spirit of love.” She put into words what she concretely meant by this in her introduction in the Register As she wrote about the “benefits of religious life that reach out.”. This is radiated in living with mutual love for one another. The happiness of the Sisters is the happiness of the needy fellow-being. The spirit of true love always leaves a trail behind.
Love for Poverty
In April 1881, Teresia wrote the Sisters about poverty. Holy Poverty, for her, is a highly exalted virtue.
This appears especially from the example of Christ himself. Hew was Lord and master of all; He becomes man comes to earth – wants to be borne of a poor Mother; – chooses a poor craftsman as His foster father and was in the last years of His life, according to His own witness, so poor that He possessed nothing; He Himself declared: “the foxes have their holes, the birds of heaven have their nest, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” From this you see, dear Sisters, how poverty is exalted. He, Who possesses everything, created everything, rules over all kingdoms, dispenses of everything, Who could have the best, the richest, the most wonderful, chooses poverty in everything to give us an example.
In the above part of her letter, Teresia van Miert outlines the path of poverty which Christ has trodden: the way from rich to poor. In her words, the choice for poverty is especial brought to the fore. Jesus chooses this life; He goes this way voluntarily. And He does that, says Teresia, to show us that the path of poverty is the way to heaven. To be poor is to choose the way that leads to happiness and in that Christ is her source of inspiration. She exhorts her Sisters to that.
In the continuation of her letter, she puts into words how the path to poverty is. It boils down to the fact that it is not an easy way. It is a way of letting-go:
The first step is to leave everything, so that one has nothing to spare. The second step is: not to be attached to earthly goods,…no more clinging to them, so that one will not anymore long for them…The third step is: not only to be detached from the above-mentioned things, but to love Poverty, and this is the highest, the most perfect step.
The letting-go is directed to love. Teresia tells that loving is our aim. Precisely because we are focusing on that aim, because our prospect5 is to enjoy, we are able to go through this difficult way. “Those who want to be perfectly poor must love poverty.” Teresia emphasizes once more. To be truly poor is more than possessing little or nothing. Naturally, when you are poor, you have little and yet you have plenty. You have gone through the way of having to being. That creates space for rejoicing. Being poor is coming home, Teresia exhorts her co-sisters. The way from rich to poor, which Christ initially seems to go, appears to be the other way round: the way from poor to rich.
Sisterly Love
From March 1886, Teresia started to write clearly about love in her letters with the Staten:
Dear Sisters!
The past year 1885 was, in all respects, characterized by abundant heavenly blessings, which pleased God to pour out with a lavish hand on our humble Congregation. We are all convinced that He, in different difficult circumstances, extended to us in a visible way His fatherly protection, light, comfort and help. God’s goodness and love demand from our side a grateful love in return.
It appears from these words that for her, human love has always something to do with God’s love for people. To love is to give a response. God’s love makes an appeal to us, she says. In His love, He speaks to us; He asks a response from us. We can read in the continuation of her letter what that response contains. She elaborated on the manner by which the Sisters can be reciprocal to one another and she emphasized that these mutual contacts should never stand on the way of their relationship with God. Being so preoccupied with somebody in which all that happens around you recedes to the background can never be good.
In the mutual relationships, Teresia dealt with the true, universal sisterly love. It is not just being nice to one another. To love, loving people. Means to be a fellow-being. To be together means that you Are so close to the other that you can see her/him as she/he would like to be seen. It is to look through the eyes of the other. By ourselves, we cannot be that, But God’s love for all people makes it possible for us and He lets us see that in the life of His Son. His life was to love and He calls us, His followers, to an imitation. We are called to enter the school of love:
May the good God (…) grant that the true, universal sisterly love be the distinctive mark of all her members. All, says the Divine Savior to his disciples, will know by this that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. For all things then, have love for one another.
Called to Love
In 1888 as Teresia, entirely in the tradition of the Penitents-Recollects, writes about the mortification, she acts out a common line. She sketches, as it were, a trail that the Sisters can follow. In a life of mortification, it means that you are joining the school of love. For Teresia, it is a reciprocal process. It is an exchange between God and people. She is convinced that mortification has something to do with the unconditional openness to God’s grace: To pray to God for the grace and the assistance which we need to conquer ourselves.
That means practically to walk through the path that Jesus trod. To follow Him is to receive His grace: God willingly strengthen the people who do their best to follow the Savior whose life has been a series of mortifications. Teresia sees this following of Jesus Christ in the light of the love for God. It is our response to what He has given up for us. The experience of His love leads to love in return:
…should you, who received so much graces from God…should you be ungrateful not to take up with love…the mortification which God sends you for your eternal salvation.
It is as if Teresia wants to say: to learn how to love is a process of growing awareness. It is coming to the realization that your love is a gift from God. It is to experience that your love is not yet your love. Love is a Gift. This experience gives you the space to tread the path that Jesus trod: the path of love.
In 1980, the year proceeding the year she relinquished her function as General Superior, Teresia elaborated on what she calls mutual affection. In one of her last letters addressed to the toher Sisters, she expressed what moves her in relation to mutual tolerance. For Teresia, the tolerance for the other person is a sign of being a follower and of being called. In this connection, she pointed to the Apostle Paul, who emphasized that we are called namely to: bear with one another in love. For her, to be called to love has everything to do with God’s compassion for us people:
We say to our Heavenly Father: forgive us, as we forgive; just like that, in the same way. O my God, forgive me in the great measure, forgive me generously, forgive me with t hat overflowing mercy, which is above all your works. – Yes, poor soul; but go first and forgive your Sister for the little offence she has done to you and come back to offer me your gifts and prayers so that I can accept them with the fulness of my love.
Teresia knows it: God loves us. And therefore, she writes, “are we not insulting the Divine Bridegroom Himself when we do not want to discover the good He has placed in a soul He loves?” For Teresia, to be affectionate to one another implies: To seek God in your fellow beings. Just like you, they are created in His image and it is our task to discover that image in the other.
Besides this, it is of importance that we can look at ourselves critically. Teresia asks herself: “What is my burden that I impose upon others? Am I not myself the cross of my neighbor? As I cannot bear one little splinter in the eye of my Sister, is there not a reason to be afraid that the beam is in my own eye? She is fully aware of her shortcomings. Her works and prayers remain unproductive. And therefore:
We plead then, dear Sisters, to the God of love to have compassion on us, who are so poor in loving and to grant us a powerful grace that will help us to tolerate others in the future out of love for Him.
Here, the essence of the spirituality of Teresia van Miert comes to light. She is convinced that we people are incapable of loving one another. True love does not find its source in human being. It is of another order. It finds its origin in God. Therefore, for her it is of paramount importance that the Divine Bridegroom loves us human beings. That is a powerful grace. Love, as it were, is a free gift from God. We receive love unconditionally. Only that makes us capable to discover God in the other human being.
The happy vocation of Teresia van Miert appears to be for her a call to love out of love.