FAQs
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Any of these points would be good enough reason to step closer and ask some more direct questions.
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| Why might God be calling me to a life in Carmel? Carmel is an opportunity of grace by which men and women can live out a consecrated religious life, a life of everything for God. The Carmelite life is an invitation to withdraw from the noise, the hustle and bustle of our modern everyday life in order primarily to learn to stand before God, motivated by the desire to walk in intimacy with the Lord. As contemplatives, we seek to know and better follow God’s will by listening to the interior sound of ‘a still small voice’ (1). We become a prophetic witness to the world in which we live our daily lives.
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| Why should one choose the Discalced Carmelites? The Discalced Carmelites live according to the spiritual reforms and teachings of the order’s founders: St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross. Their reform was to found communities for men and women who wanted to devote their lives to following the original rule, given by St. Albert, more completely. During the sixteenth century, these two saints discerned a need to bring the order back from certain perceived laxities which had become established procedure in convents and monasteries of Carmelites. Their labors resulted in a stricter form of observance of an ancient rule. This was a rule written at the beginning of the thirteenth century by the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem. It was given to the first group of Christian hermits who came together as a community living on Mount Carmel, Haifa, Israel, inspired by the prophetic model of St. Elijah.
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| How important is prayer in the Carmelite life? Prayer and presence to the Holy Trinity is the very heart of our life in Carmel. We look to God’s instruction to Joshua, Son of Nun, that we find in the book of Joshua: “This book of the law shall not depart out of your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it;” (2) St. John of the Cross, whom we call our ‘father founder’, teaches us to “seek in reading and you will find in meditation; knock in prayer and it will be opened to you in contemplation.” (3). The ‘Ascent of Mount Carmel’ is the title given to one of St. John’s great literary works. Another Carmelite describes the same thing that St. John is calling ‘The Ascent’, but calls it ‘Divine Intimacy’ (4). St Teresa adds to our understanding of the essentials of Carmelite prayer when she says: “if the soul walks with a pure conscience, it is this that most unites it with its creator.” (5)
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| Can you tell me something about how Carmelites pray? We seek the grace of God to learn from the Holy Spirit how to pray with and from the heart. St. Teresa of Avila, whom we call our ‘mother founder’, teaches this prayer of the heart in her book ‘The Way of Perfection’. Such a disposition of prayer requires the grace to know whom this great God is, whose presence we come into, and who I am, in all my unworthiness, who is invited to come so freely into His presence. St. John of the Cross has a saying that describes why and how the heart seeks this ‘Divine Intimacy’: “If anyone is seeking God, the Beloved is seeking that person much more.” (6)
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| What areas of ministry among God’s people do the Discalced Carmelites particularly get involved with? As our mission in life is seeking Divine Intimacy by asking the Lord to rend ‘the veil of this sweet encounter’ (7), we are called to remain in or near our cell, (that is how the ancient rule describes our room), meditating upon the Law of the Lord both day and night. When the ministry of loving service to the people of God calls us from these meditations, we go. Our intention is to bring forth the fruits of our meditations in prophetic witness, as did the great prophet of Israel – St. Elijah.
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| What, if any, are the age restrictions that you put on applicants, and are there any other absolute requirements? Every applicant is given consideration according to the merits of his own situation. Some religious orders and their provinces have an age limit of between 18 and 35 years. The only absolute requirements are:a baptized Catholic, a single man who loves the Lord and desires to grow in a consecrated life of loving the Lord our God, with all one’s heart, one’s mind, and one’s soul and, with this, desires to love their neighbor as themselves.
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| Who can I contact if I wish to discuss some more? e-mail Vocations Director, Fr. Dominic Borg, OCD
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1. 1 Kings 19:12 |
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