SECULAR ORDER OF DISCALCED CARMELITES
England, Wales and Scotland

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

B orn in Bratislava in the kingdom of Hungary, St Elizabeth of Hungary (whose feast day is today) was betrothed at the age of four to Ludwig of Thuringia (Germany) in order to reinforce political alliances between the families and sent to live at his father’s court in Wartburg. Their marriage was solemnised when she was fourteen and he twenty-one.   They had three children in quick succession, and seem to have been happily married . I n 1223, Franciscan friars arrived, and El

Many Carmelites have a favourite Carmelite saint or author.  Perhaps it is the one who first introduced them to Carmel.  Perhaps it is the one who wrote their favourite Carmelite text.  That is all to the good, because people are so very different, we differ by our personalities, by our characters, by our interest, by our inclinations, and by our preferences.  I was originally introduced to Carmel by St John of the Cross and it took a while for me to grow in appreciation of S

Late home last night after a rather long journey to Manchester where we have a wonderful new OCDS group.  We talked about yesterday’s saint – Josaphat – who was born in what is now Ukraine, and we said a prayer for Ukraine.  I compare him with our St Thomas More and St John Fisher and the other Reformation martyrs, because like them he suffered martyrdom in defence of the unity of the Church with the See of Peter.  Down to this day, so many fail to understand that this is a f

Today’s feast of St Josaphat, Archbishop of Polotsk and martyr (1580-1623) draws our attention to a part of the world (Ukraine, Belarus, Russia) that is tormented by conflict at the present time.  The story of this saint is hard to follow because it involved struggles with which most of us are not familiar, but the long and the short of it is that he as an Eastern Catholic promoted unity with Rome in a part of the world dominated by the Orthodox Church and he was put to death

When you are long enough in Carmel, they start to ask you to be responsible for the formation of others, and that is a wonderful blessing.  Spiritual sharing is one of life’s magical experiences, it involves souls drawing close to one another.  It provides an opportunity for heart to speak to heart.  The Carmelite saints bring us into the depths of ourselves and enable us to get a glimpse of the depths of others.  It’s a kind of sharing that doesn’t necessarily happen much in

Carmel has influenced my life in so many ways, conscious and unconscious, Carmel has given me so many and varied gifts.  For example, it was only when I became a Carmelite that I started to follow the daily Office of Readings, and to me one of the stars of this Office is St Leo the Great (400-461), whose feast day is today.  He has a gift for clarity and vividness of expression, and to me he is one of the greatest of the Church Fathers (and not just for his writings, for his

Today we remember the Spanish priest Francisco Palau y Quer OCD (in religion Francisco of Jesus, Mary and Joseph , 1811 – 1872).  To read an account of his life is to be confronted with the challenges and conflicts that engulfed the Church in his country in the nineteenth century.  Until recently I did not realise how much persecution Catholics endured in Spain in the nineteenth century from some of their governments.  At one point he was forced to take refuge in France, wher