The full response to this objection (rejection of St John of the Cross’ Nada theology) may be positively explained in our chapter on freedom, for thorough understanding is the best answer to partial views. A few short comments will suffice for now. People who argue against detachment and self-deniel are perhaps unaware that they are simultaneously rejecting the same teaching found in the New Testament. Jesus lays it down that to be his disciple, anyone and everyone must “renounce all that he possesses”, not just part or most of it. In Titus 2:12 we read that “what we have to do is give up everything that does not lead to God”. John and Teresa ask not a whit more…or less. Texts like these could be multiplied. We must further note that in our human, finite condition, every choice necessarily entails negations. If I spend money for one thing. I cannot spend it on something else. No man can love two women with his whole heart. No one can serve God and mammon. No one can attain an ecstatic joy in God without giving up paltry, self-centered pleasures in things less than God. People who reject Gospel detachment cannot have clearly thought it through. Like the adolescent who sees no value in Dante or Shakespeare or Michelangelo because comic strips have captured his fancy, the adult who discounts evangelical detachment cannot have experienced the sublime infused love found in advanced prayer. One can only wonder if this individual has ever tasted even a morsel of it. Can he know what St Paul meant when he spoke of rejoicing in the Lord always or “having nothing, possessing all things”? Does this person believe what Jesus himself taught, namely, that it is a hard road and a narrow gate that leads to life and that there is no other way to happiness on earth? —Father Thomas Dubay ‘Fire Within: St Teresa of Avila St John of the Cross and the Gospel on Prayer