A man and a half

The reforming revolution of John of the Cross

By Silvano Cola

Nine months of imprisonment, 270 days of isolation in a suffocating tomb smaller than eight square feet. The only window of the dirty cell, if you could call it that, was a slit three fingers wide that opened onto a corridor.

The unusual inmate had been seized at night by an armed band, who bashed his door down and handcuffed him in case he resisted. His only reaction was to look at them and say, “Well then, let’s go.”

A long night march followed, blindfolded. As they entered Toledo, 50 miles south of Madrid, they made him take many turns along narrow streets to disorient him. Such treatment could only be for a dangerous rebel.

Brother John de Yepes was just that. He had decided to become a Carmelite, setting aside earthly things and trusting everything to God. It was a difficult decision to make, but John expected after entering the convent, where he would find heaven on earth,
a spiritual atmosphere and constant recollection.

Instead, he felt betrayed. At Carmel, life went on more or less like the outside world — each interpreting the rigid Carmelite rule to his own tastes or thoughtlessly ignoring it. The brothers were so accustomed to a comfortable life that not long before, when the Superior General, Audet, had tried to bring them back to the old observance with severe laws of reform, the convents of Castile and Andalusia had rebelled against him, challenging tradition in the name of modern times.

John seriously thought of leaving Carmel and becoming a Carthusian. It was cowardly, he knew, but he did not feel like struggling like the reformer of Avila, Teresa, was doing. Though attacked by nuns, monks, priests and the civil authorities, she had succeeded in founding the first monastery of the reform and saving it from attempts to destroy it. She even founded a second one right in Medina del Campo, where John was going to celebrate his first Mass.

“What a soul, that Teresa of Avila!” he thought, but did nothing to see her. Teresa, aware that a young Carmelite called John had a thirst for perfection, said,
“I want to see him.”

It was the fall of 1567. She was 52, he 25. The meeting took place in secret, hidden from the monks “because that revolutionary,” they said, “is not to be trusted.” And they were right. When Teresa left her meeting with John, she ran quickly to her nuns, saying: “Do you know what? We already have a monk and a half to start the reform of the men religious! Let’s thank the Lord.”

A monk and a half — Mother Teresa had a sense of humor! John was, in fact, short — a half monk was more like it. Yet a new spirit had entered him: Teresa’s.

The Gospel revolution now advanced on two fronts of a languishing religious order. Teresa herself established the first convent for men: a little house composed of a kitchen and a room divided in two. “Well, I would be fine even in a pigsty,” John said. Teresa beamed.

John was not alone for long; soon he founded five other homes for his “discalced” [without shoes]Carmelites, and the “calced” [with shoes] felt threatened and moved to suppress them. Teresa was ordered not to leave the convent under risk of excommunication and was prohibited from founding new houses. John was seized and imprisoned in Toledo.

Winter was terribly cold, and summer transformed the stone walls into blocks of fire. Hunger, fever and lice tormented John — trifles, however, compared with his inner pain. What of his “discalced”? Would the spark of reform be suffocated?

John planned his escape. Better to die by accident on the cliff rocks of the Tagus River or under torture than to die slowly of hunger and asphyxiation.

Focus your thoughts. A half turn of the screw will loosen the lock. Carry a needle and thread with the excuse of mending your shirt, which is in tatters. Throw the thread from the loophole with a little stone tied to the end of it, in order to calculate the height from the ground. Make the bedcovers into strips and tie them. Test their resistance. Sleep. Relax. Save energy. And may God help you.

It was 2:00 a.m. A push of the shoulder and the lock fell. John ran toward the window opening onto the Tagus, fixed the makeshift rope to a hook, jumped, let himself slide, then leaped onto the massive sustaining wall. Another leap and he was on the street below.

They searched unsuccessfully for him for several days; all the while he was safe nearby among the “discalced” of St. Joseph’s monastery. The movement of the reform was saved.

Later John would again meet the cross. Passing “through a dark night, burning with a love full of anguish,” St. John of the Cross (1542–1591) carried out
his revolution in the world.

Fr. Silvano Cola (1928–2007) served as director of the Focolare International Center for Priests in Italy beginning in 1964.

John of the Cross (1542-1591) was a mystical theologian and a poet. With Teresa of Avila, he co-founded the Discalced Carmelites.