Who was Saint John of the Cross??
“Where there is no love, put love and you will find love.” This statement was written by John of the Cross, a man who loved and forgave those who had locked him in a dark six-by-ten-foot cell for nine months. John’s wealthy Spanish father had been disowned by his family because he married a poor weaver. Living in poverty proved to be too much for him, and he died before John was a year old. John spent much of his youth in an institution, where he was clothed, fed and educated. At the age of seventeen, he found a job as a male nurse in a hospital and was accepted into a Jesuit college. In 1563 he entered the Carmelite Order. Then he enrolled in another university, where he did so well that he was asked to teach a class and to help settle disputes. When John met Teresa of Avila and learned from her about the reform of the Carmelite Order, he decided to help with it. For this reason he wore sandals instead of shoes and lived very simply in prayer and solitude. In 1577 the attitude toward
