Carmelite Quote



Image in Carmelite Monastery Cleveland, Oh.

 St. John of the Cross
Feast Day: December 14

...Some examples of these habitual imperfections are: the common habit of being very talkative; a small attachment one never really desires to conquer, for example, to a person, to clothing, to a book or a cell, or to the way food is prepared, and to other trifling conversations and little satisfactions in tasting, knowing, and hearing things, and so on. Any of these habitual imperfections to which there is attachment is as harmful to progress in virtue as the daily commission of many other imperfections and sporadic venial sins that do not result from a bad habit. These latter will not hinder a person as much as will the attachment to something. As long as this attachment remains, it is impossible to make progress in perfection, even though the imperfection may be very small.
Ascent of Mt. Carmel Book I Chap. 11, No. 4

Peace be with you!
Rosemarie, ocds
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Carmelite Saint of the Day

Bls. Denis and Redemptus

Denis of the Nativity, a priest, called in the world Pierre Berthelot, was born in Honfleur in France in 1600. He was a cartographer and naval commander for the kings of Portugal and France before he joined the Discalced Carmelites in Goa in 1635. It was also at Goa that the Portuguese lay brother, Thomas Rodriguez de Cunha, born in 1598, had made his profession in 1615, taking the name Redemptus of the Cross. They were sent to the island of Sumatra, where, in the town of Achen, they received the martyr’s crown on November 29, 1638.

Peace be with you!
Rosemarie, ocds
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The Season of Advent: A Time of Waiting upon the Lord in Faith...
Let us keep watch with Mary, Our Mother!

The Catechism of the Catholic Church on Prayer

Pope Benedict XVI Declares a "Year of Faith"

Pope Benedict XVI has declared a Year of Faith, beginning on October 11, 2012, the fiftieth anniversary of the Second Vatican Council.

I have decided to announce a Year of Faith. It will begin on 11 October 2012, the fiftieth anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council, and it will end on the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Universal King, on 24 November 2013. The starting date of 11 October 2012 also marks the twentieth anniversary of the publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, a text promulgated by my Predecessor, Blessed John Paul II, with a view to illustrating for all the faithful the power and beauty of the faith. This document, an authentic fruit of the Second Vatican Council, was requested by the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops in 1985 as an instrument at the service of catechesis and it was produced in collaboration with all the bishops of the Catholic Church...

The Year of Faith, from this perspective, is a summons to an authentic and renewed conversion to the Lord, the one Savior of the world. In the mystery of his death and resurrection, God has revealed in its fullness the Love that saves and calls us to conversion of life through the forgiveness of sins (cf. Acts 5:31). For Saint Paul, this Love ushers us into a new life: "We were buried ... with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life" (Rom 6:4). Through faith, this new life shapes the whole of human existence according to the radical new reality of the resurrection.

Peace be with you!

Rosemarie, ocds

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Saturday of Our Lady

...Free of every profane entanglement, Mary attended to God and her domestic duties with the freedom of a soul that is liberated from all purely human thoughts and worries.
Through a special grace Mary had a sure mastery of all the movements of her heart; yet she took the most scrupulous care to keep it free of any distraction...
How many holy hermits and virgins have reached the heights of sanctity simply through the merits of an interior life!
The man given to externals, on the contrary, is anxious and agitated by countless trifles that are unworthy of his attention, and so he loses pace and tranquility...
Try, then, to remain within yourself and give yourself to external affairs only when God requires it...
From the Imitation of Mary Book II Chap. 19

Carmelite Nuns-Sioux City, Iowa

Peace be with you!
Rosemarie, ocds
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Carmelite Quote

One dark night,

fired with love's urgent longings

--ah, the sheer grace!--

I went out unseen,

my house being now all stilled.

This dark night is an inflow of God into the soul, which purges it of its habitual ignorances and imperfections, natural and spiritual, and which the contemplatives call infused contemplation or mystical theology. Through this contemplation, God teaches the soul secretly and instructs it in the perfection of love without its doing anything or understanding how this happens.
St. John of the Cross The Dark Night, Chap. 5


Peace be with you!
Rosemarie, ocds
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Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Read more about this feast

Peace be with you!
Rosemarie, ocds
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Let us pray to Christ the King. He is the firstborn of all creation; all things exist in him.

– May your kingdom come, O Lord.

Christ, you are our savior and our God, our shepherd and our king,
lead your people to life-giving pastures.
– May your kingdom come, O Lord.

Good Shepherd, you laid down your life for your sheep,
rule over us, and in your care we shall want for nothing.
– May your kingdom come, O Lord.

Christ, our redeemer, you have been made king over all the earth,
restore all creation in yourself.
– May your kingdom come, O Lord.

King of all creation, you came into the world to bear witness to the truth,
may all men come to acknowledge your primacy in all things.
– May your kingdom come, O Lord.

Christ, our model and master, you have brought us into your kingdom,
grant that we may be holy and blameless before you this day.
– May your kingdom come, O Lord.

PRAYER:
Almighty and merciful God,

you break the power of evil
and make all things new
in your Son Jesus Christ, the King of the universe.
May all in heaven and earth acclaim your glory
and never cease to praise you.
We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.
– Amen.

Visit the Carmelite Monastery-Zephyr, Canada

Peace be with you!
Rosemarie, ocds
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