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The
Carmelite Order, throughout its long history spanning
more than 8 centuries has given to the Church great and
numerous saints: monks, missionaries and mystics. Carmel
sprang up in the Church as God's gift to a society that
was more concerned for external wealth, pomp and glory
while the true inner worth of human person, individually
and collectively, as image and likeness of God and His
preferred dialogue partner, was lost sight of. Human
greatness was seen in the concentration in an individual
of a nation, of brute power, economical and social,
rather than the blossoming of inner life, in response to
communion with God in prayer.
Hence the Carmelite Order embarked on the mission of
giving back soul to the society and the individual,
enmeshed in worldly power by affirming radically the
Gospel values of inner worth of human person in
communion with God, and as a sign thereof living
together as community of prayer and fraternity: elements
fundamental to the N. Testament Christian faith.
The Prophet Elias on Mt. Carmel who lived always in
God's presence, and courageously stood for social
justice and against every form of idolatry; and Mary
Mother of Jesus who kept pondering the marvels of God's
design and surrendered herself, have been the two
fundamental inspirations of Carmelite life of
contemplation. No doubt, true to the socio-political
mentality of the time serious commitment to religious
life was reserved for men. Women were not to appear in
public life. The credit goes to Bl. John Soreth. He, as
the supreme moderator of the Carmelite Order in 1452
broke this false monopoly and proposed for courageous
women a form of strict cloistered life of contemplation
and sisterly communion, without external apostolate.
St. Teresa of Avila 1515-1582 appearing in the
renaissance period prompted by the inner voice took upon
herself the task of reviving the pristine spirit among
the Carmelites: men and women. Her 'Tabor experience'
gave her all the strength she required to swim as a
spiritual luminary in a sea dominated by men. She
restored among the nuns the 'spiritual desert' of
silence, solitude, poverty and prayer of the early
Carmelite tradition. With the help of St. John of the
Cross she brought about a similar renewal among the
Carmelite friars as well. When St. Teresa died in 1582
there were 17 monasteries of Nuns and 15 of Friars. Down
the years the Church has recognized the eminent teaching
on spiritual life and heroic witness of Christian
virtues among many Carmelites. There are as of now,
three doctors of the Church and many a great mystic who
have shown by their life the rich spiritual wealth of
the Christian faith.
This spiritual revolution ignited the imagination and
faith in the western Church within a short time. Her
spiritual sons marched out of Europe in hoards, to
distant lands, not to conquer the lands along the
colonizers, but to offer the spiritual wealth of
Christian faith. If friars reached the shores of India
the land of sadhus and sages, within three decades after
the death of St. Teresa, the cloistered nuns had to wait
for the call from the Carmelite bishop to make their
first foundation in Mangalore in 1870. The first novice
of the cloistered nuns in India is a Blessed Mystic of
the Church: Bl. Mary of Jesus Crucified (Miriam Bouardy),
known better as the little Arab, a daughter of Palestine
and of the East.
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