#8217; houses, an extraordinary vote of confidence. These five years were the happiest of her religious life.Throughout the next nine years, Teresa founded twelve houses, traveling all through Spain. She faced horrible conditions, opposition all the time and increasing ill health. In this period of her life, she wrote many letters that show her as a very human person with a shrewd sense of business. She became well know and respected by royalty in Spain.Teresa’s spiritual life increasingly developed intensity, all the way to a mystical union with God. She felt she had become “one” with God in some way, constantly aware of God’s presence where her only desire was for God’s will to be done. She wrote to her brother that she was having “raptures” (visions and voices) in public and appearing as if she were drunk.In 1576, the Calked (unreformed friars) attempted to stop Teresa’s reform by kidnapping and sending to prison her closest friend and leader of the Discalced, Saint John of the Cross and others on house arrest. Spain viewed Teresa as “restless, disobedient, who told of false doctrines against the order of the Council of Trent”. The Carmelite Convent of the Incarnation asked Teresa to be their prioress, and were excommunicated from the Council of Trent and forbidden to accept any more novices. Phillip II, King of Spain and supporter of the reform, was Teresa’s friend. Teresa asked Phillip to help with her problem with his royalty. They made peace in 1580, when the Discalced Carmelites were given the right to separate from the Calced. Which eventually helped toward the Order in 1594.Teresa, from 1580 to 1582, established four more foundations during this period and arranged for a fifth one to be made by Saint John of the Cross. While still traveling, Teresa again (yes, again) became sick and wanted to return to Avila. Teresa could only make it back to Alba ...
