God Alone Is Enough: A Spirited Journey with Teresa of Avila
Immersed in her own £dark night of the soul¥ brought on by seasonal affective disorder and fibromyalgia, Christian novelist Burney (The Exorsistah and the Amanda Bell Brown mystery series) discovered the 16th-century mystic John of the Cross and, through him, his spiritual contemporary Teresa of Avila. In her first nonfiction book, Burney tells how Teresa taught her to pray in a way totally unlike the method she had learned from the £church mothers¥ in the Church of God in Christ congregation in which she grew up. She invites readers on a pilgrimage to £meet my friend Teresa¥ and offers a fresh take on the Spanish nun and saint. Employing humor and a chatty style, Burney gives readers a short, light course in contemplative prayer, one that is sensitive to the possible reactions of those who, like her, come from a Protestant background. Although readers with a serious interest in Teresa will need more than Burney provides here, her book is a fine introduction to the weighty realm of contemplative prayer.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.