SECULAR ORDER OF DISCALCED CARMELITES
England, Wales and Scotland

I shall be travelling to help celebrate some birthdays over the next few days, so the blog will be suspended till Wednesday 17th December (when I have to attend a funeral!)

Yesterday evening my own Secular Group was able by coincidence to be present when the body of the late Joy Smith OCDS was received into St Gregory and St Augustine church in north Oxford prior to her funeral.  For many years Joy had been the Parish Secretary.  Although our paths had crossed a few times, I did not know her well, but I could not fail to be impressed by the warmth with which people spoke about her beauty of character.  Even when she was already very sick, she wa

Today we remember a modern Spanish Carmelite saint not well known in these islands, St Maria Maravillas.  I have borrowed this summary of her life from a Carmelite website.  ‘ Maria Maravillas was born at Madrid in 1891. She entered the El Escorial Carmel, Madrid on 12th October 1919. In 1924 she was inspired to found a Carmel at Cerro de los Angeles, alongside the monument to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. From this foundation followed nine others in Spain and one in India. She

I was discussing St John of the Cross with a fellow Carmelite yesterday and she used an extraordinary word to describe him, saying that she finds his words ‘soothing’.  I can identify with that, because although his emphasis on darkness and nothingness can make him seem quite forbidding, the message at the heart of his thought is that nothing matters more than God.  But if nothing matters more than God - and we know that God is unchanging and his love our ultimate resource –

The Office of Readings is such a gift – an extraordinary range of offerings.  Most are from the Church Fathers but some come from later writings and even – as today – from the twentieth century, the Vatican II document Lumen Gentium.  This chronological depth is a reminder of the vast history of the Church, a history going back even before Christ to the saints and the wonders and the wisdom of the people of Israel.  In committing myself to Carmel, I had a secret fear that I w

Today’s Feast of the Immaculate Conception reminds me of my attitude as a born-again Christian before I came into the Church.  In those days such doctrines (the Assumption being another) seemed to me and my peers to be gratuitous additions to Bible teaching by an ecclesial body out of control.  The Catholic hierarchy had developed an obsession with Mary which distracted people from the centrality of Jesus, the Redeemer of humanity.  Entering then into Holy Mother Church mysel

I need do little more today than reproduce an extract from today’s Office of Readings, which seems to me to be perfect for a Carmelite.  Not to mention that it was written by a man who served in these islands for the last fifteen years of his life as Archbishop of Canterbury - St Anselm of Aosta (1033/4-1109 ):  ‘Flee your preoccupations for a little while. Hide yourself for a time from your turbulent thoughts. Cast aside, now, your heavy responsibilities and put off your bur

In our new Manchester OCDS group somebody mentioned the name of Pedro Ballester, previously unknown to me, as a potential Manchester saint.  I did some research and discovered that he was Pedro Ballester Arenas (1996-2018), engineering student and member of Opus Dei, who died in 2018 in Manchester from bone cancer.  According to one website ‘ He had an ordinary life, which left an extraordinary mark.  On one occasion Pedro felt nauseated by the treatment he was receiving at t

The latest issue of Communicationes, the bulletin sent out from Rome by the General Curia of the Teresian Carmel, contains an item that triggers memories for me.  It is a report of the visit of the relics of St Therese of Lisieux to the Carmelite Monastery of Our Lady of Grace and St Therese in Carmel, California, on the occasion of the centenary of the foundation of the monastery.  Two memories in particular.  First, some years ago I was privileged to visit the chapel of thi

My good friend Richard died early yesterday morning.  When we first met thirty years ago we discovered that we had been born on literally the same day - and that gave us a special bond.  I will hold in my memory the thought of Richard’s unfailing kindness and helpfulness.  For example, he happily stepped in and drove a friend of mine sixty miles there and back when I could not keep my own promise of a lift to that friend.  His passing will leave a hole, but I instinctively tu

I am fascinated by the extent of St Teresa’s continuing influence over souls.  A wonderful example is the Frenchman St Charles de Foucauld (1858-1916), whose feast day is today.  Charles lost his faith as an adolescent.  In his twenties in Morocco he saw the way Muslims expressed their faith and he began repeating, “My God, if you exist, let me come to know you.”  He rediscovered God at the age of 28. He spent 7 years as a Trappist, first in France and then at Akbès in Syria.

I found this reflection for Advent on The Sisters of Carmel website, suggesting that the season of expectant waiting is paradoxically also a season of remembrance. ' As we approach the end of the liturgical year, and the calendar year, too, we are once more faced with the consideration of the end of time – and most people sense a personal realization of it, in a way, because we all must admit how swiftly this year has passed.  These days of a waning November always give a se

As Advent is almost upon us I reproduce extracts from an Advent sermon given by Fr Michael-Joseph of Saint Therese OCD - courtesy of the Washington OCD Province website: ‘Advent is the Carmelite season; it speaks so much to who we are. Way back early in seminary I picked up a little book called ‘ John of the Cross, Advent Saint’ . I can’t remember anything else from this book, but the title at least stuck with me! The Advent themes of silence, prayer, loving attentiveness in

I was looking up today’s saint, the Franciscan St Leonard of Porto Maurizio (1676-1751), known throughout Italy for his missions and retreats, and came across this on the Catholic Ireland website: ‘ Leonard realised that he needed time to pray alone, and so he regularly began to make use of the ritiri (houses of recollection) that he helped establish throughout Italy. The first he founded in 1710 on a peak in the mountains where he and his assistants could retire from time to

Off to Hereford today to visit the Benedictine Belmont Abbey.  The monks have recently opened a new retreat house and we are hoping to hold a Seculars Retreat there in 2026 to replace our planned Douai Abbey retreat - which has had unfortunately to be cancelled.  The Benedictines have a wonderful record of offering premises for retreats – we have used their Abbey at Ampleforth for many years.  For a couple of years we did enjoy the services of our fellow Carmelites at Aylesfo

I have recently taken over as Registrar for the Seculars, a task which Chris Noble performed valiantly for many years.  There is a wonderful old book containing a record of Promises made since 1882!  Sadly, it is not complete because it relies on group leaders and Community Presidents keeping the Registrar informed, and for various reasons that does not always happen.  One striking feature of the record is that right up to the 1970s and 1980s Seculars would take a new name in

A fascinating feature of our Carmelite saints for me is that as we discuss their writings in our Secular meetings, we find ourselves drawn into issues where our faith does not provide any direct and simple answers.  The Catechism lays down principles, but we have then to apply those principles in our daily lives, and that brings us face to face with dilemmas.  How to share our faith with our children, what to do when they rebel, how to cope with relationship challenges, how t

Some years ago I was talking to someone about a particular Carmelite convent I had visited; this convent had impressed me very much and I was shocked to hear that it was closing.  I asked somebody who knew the convent well why this had happened and she immediately referred to damaging leadership.  In meditating the life of St Edmund King and Martyr – feast day today – I find myself turning my thoughts again to this topic of leadership, a perennial issue that affects us all. 

The Frenchman St Hugh of Lincoln (1135-1200, today’s saint) was an influential figure in his day, an adviser to monarchs.  I confess a particular attachment to him because he is the patron of Nottingham Diocese - in which I have been based for the past thirty-three years.  I can’t come up with a connection to Carmel – he died before the Carmelites arrived here in flight from the Holy Land, but he was a Carthusian, and as a Carmelite I always feel a kinship with that Order; th

Why do a blog on our website?  My idea is that a website like ours is somewhat static – apart from the news section it inevitably does not change a great deal, so after a person has looked at it once, there may be no great incentive for that person to look back at it again.  The blog of course does change and in theory at least it provides a reason for people to return to the website.  Nowadays by the way the website is a very important entry point for newcomers to the Secula