New Music USA Online Library

Orison of Ste Theresa is a setting of Longfellow's English translation of a prayer by 16th century mystic, Ste. Theresa of Avila, who believed in the sanctity of simple acts when those acts were imbued with the grace of faith. 

The focus of the prayer (or Orison) is faith as consolation, portrayed in the music by the lullaby-like choral lines which gently soothe the quietly gasping sobs of the strings.

 A Spanish Carmelite nun, mystic, and Doctor of the Church, best known for her spiritual writings, The Interior Castle and The Way of Perfection, she also wrote this luminous prayer survives in her own handwritten Spanish as well as in Longfellow’s literal yet lyrical translation:

Let nothing disturb you,

Nothing affright you.

All things are passing;

God never changeth.

Patience endureth,

Attaineth all things.

Who God possesseth,

In nothing is wanting.

Alone God sufficeth.