An Intimate Good: A Skeptical Christian Mystic in Conversation with Teresa of Avila

At age twenty-one, the pain of losing her mother to cancer sent Laurel Mathewson—with a naturally skeptical and questioning outlook—on a years-long existential journey. After an unexpected, overwhelming experience of God’s love, Laurel felt God say to her, “Turn to Teresa. She will guide you.” She understood that “Teresa” was the sixteenth-century saint Teresa of Avila, but she knew very little about her. Even after becoming an Episcopal priest, she had never read more than a few pages of T...