The great saint and mystic from her human side: frank testimonies of common sense and unvarnished honesty. An enlightening, uplifting, and delicious read that shows Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), the famous mystic and convent founder, from her lesser-known human side: how she describes her life's journey; how openly she expresses herself to her closest friends; what she thinks about God and the world (from A for age, work, asceticism to F for women and friendships to V for fathers and W for "What God wants"). When one writes about saints, one usually filters out what they did and said that emphasizes their piety and spiritual greatness and reproduces what has pronounced spiritual content. The editor, Wolfgang Bader, goes with his selection for this book.