Above: a community of Carmelites at prayer
Posted on 08/18/2024 6:39:43 PM PDT by ebb tide
Above: a community of Carmelites at prayer
Editor’s note: as we can see with the traditional Benedictines of Mary, female religious vocations are exploding… if they are traditional. Please donate today to help these sisters whose prayers will move mountains in our time. They are in great need of the assistance of the faithful!
A Carmelite community is starting a traditional Catholic Carmelite monastery in High Springs, Florida. The community, Our Lady Co-Redemptrix Carmelite Monastery, is being founded by Sister Loretta-Maria of the Blessed Trinity and the Rosary, a Carmelite nun from a Carmelite monastery in Savannah, Georgia.
The Savannah Carmel was suppressed and closed in 2022 under the new Cor Orans document issued in April 2018 by the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life. The Savannah Carmel is one of hundreds of contemplative monasteries worldwide being suppressed for not cooperating with the new liberal theology directives of the Cor Orans document.
Among these new directives includes requiring all contemplative communities to be affiliated under a Federation that supersedes the autonomous life of the monastic orders. Contemplative nuns are now obligated to participate in periodical meetings and information sessions that take them outside the cloister to different places. At these meetings, they are taught new teachings that are quite frankly tenants of liberal theology and Modernism such as the “synodal way of Saint Teresa” (which may be an oxymoron).
The Federations will not approve their vows within their respective monasteries if they don’t attend these meetings. In addition, this forced need to travel and leave the enclosure of the cloister greatly undermines and disrupts the contemplative life of prayer that these nuns have been called to fulfill as their vocation.
The document Traditionis Custodes of 2021 also affected the spiritual growth of the contemplative life in the Church by suppressing the daily celebration of the Traditional Latin Mass worldwide. It is harder today than ever before for traditional Contemplative Nuns to attend the greatest prayer this side of Heaven within their monasteries.
Our community is reinvigorated by the courageous African Bishops who steadfastly refused to cooperate with the Fiducia Supplicans document of 2023. Their witness spotlights an important truth of our Catholic Faith. We are lovingly obligated to not cooperate with dictates that harm the salvation of souls. Even when they come from lawful superiors. As the Bishops of Africa remain firm against adhering to Fiducia Supplicans, our community seeks to firmly resist cooperation with Cor Orans or Traditionis Custodes. Both documents have been found to be detrimental to the contemplative life and the salvation of souls.
Our hope is to establish a new community of women religious in the spirit of the Discalced Carmelite Order for the greater glory of God, the salvation of souls, and the preservation of the traditional charism of Saint Teresa of Avila. We also seek to safeguard the daily celebration of Traditional Latin Mass within our monastery.
As our Carmelite history has taught us, we are not affiliating or associating with a diocese. We are not a part of the new Cor Orans Federated Carmelite Order. All diocesan-rite contemplatives and all contemplative orders must be affiliated with the Cor Orans federations. Our community aspires to fulfill our vocations to the Carmelite charism by living according to the precepts of Canon 215 of the Code of Canon Law. A detailed explanation of Canon 215 is outlined in the OnePeterFive article entitled “Religious Life: Operation Survival.”
An excerpt from this article explaining Canon 215 is noteworthy:
These canons and citations are crucial because, often, new communities are asked whether or not they have a bishop’s ‘approval.’ The New Commentary [on the Code of Canon Law] removes all doubt that a bishop’s approval is not necessary for a group of individuals to begin to live together to live a more ascetical life and pursue the Christian vocation in a more intense way…Non-ordained Religious Brothers and Sisters being persecuted for the traditional Catholic religion and liturgy ought to have no fear in appearing “schismatic,” since Canon Law allows for the existence of de facto associations. Laity ought not to fear to support these groups embracing great depths of uncertainty in order to remain faithful to the faith.
His Excellency Bishop Athanasius Schneider blessed our ongoing efforts to establish our Traditional Carmelite monastery in Florida, independent of any diocese. His formal letter of blessing is posted on our website homepage. His Excellency has given us his blessing to our monastic building project as we seek to serve the Holy Roman Catholic Church as an autonomous monastic community.
We have also founded a 501(c)(3) non-profit for our building fund, which we call “Habit Forming Sisters Corporation.” This 501(c)(3) non-profit is for the purpose of safeguarding the donations and property of our monastic community. The hundreds of monasteries worldwide that are suppressed under Cor Orans have witnessed the monastic property and assets being forcibly stripped from the monastic community, the nuns being forced to leave the monasteries, with some of the older ones being told to “look for a nursing home.” We want to keep safe the property and donations given to us so that a repeat of what happened to these suppressed monasteries will not happen again.
Our building project is expected, God-willing, to be a 5-year plan. We have acquired 10 acres of land near High Springs, Florida, where our new monastery is being built. We are dedicating our new Traditional Carmelite Monastery to Our Lady Co-Redemptrix, and we will have a chapel in honor of Our Lady of Sorrows. We hope to have the Traditional Latin Mass and sacraments celebrated daily.
We will be seeking to connect with good Catholic priests, who have the full faculties to celebrate the Sacraments validly in the Catholic Church. These priests will offer the Traditional Latin Mass daily. Our community is not and will never be affiliated or associated with schismatic or sedevacantist groups. (Period!)
Our community has a very special love and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, especially through the Messages of Fatima. We hope in seeking to build this new traditional Carmelite monastery for the greater glory of God to help in our own small way within a proper monastic enclosure to further the coming Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Sister Loretta-Maria has expressed our community’s desire to build our new monastery in the following manner:
All we want is to live a quiet, simple, and private life of prayer and solitude, to participate in the Mass of the Ages, raise a few chickens and plant some vegetables. We will follow the Discalced Carmelite Constitutions written by Holy Mother Saint Teresa of Avila, the Rule of Carmel written by Saint Albert of Jerusalem, as well as various Carmelite ceremonials and spiritual manuals that have governed the Traditional Discalced Carmelite Order since its founding. We will keep the religious vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience, living out all the customs and traditions of the Discalced Carmelite Order founded by Holy Mother Saint Teresa of Avila.
We are in need of funds for the building of our traditional Carmelite monastery in High Springs, Florida. Our building project is a hopeful, 5-year plan. We post updates of our building progress on our website. One may also subscribe to receive monthly email updates of the building progress.
Anyone can make a donation to our monastery through our 501(c)(3) non-profit Habit Forming Sisters Corporation via our website donation page or by purchasing one of our handmade items on our online shop on Etsy.
One may also mail us a donation to:
Habit Forming Sisters Corporation
PO Box 564
Richmond Hill, GA 31324
We will keep all of our donors perpetually remembered in the records of our monastery to pray for them and their families, even after death. Our community will also be praying the Divine Office for the Dead monthly for the souls of our benefactors and those who have been added to our prayer list by their families.
We are grateful to our donors for their prayerful support. We pray for the coming Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary in union with the Sacred Heart of Jesus. We pray for Pope Francis, all the bishops of the world, the priests and religious, and all the faithful of the holy Catholic Church. Jesus and Mary love you!
Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us! Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us!
Among these new directives includes requiring all contemplative communities to be affiliated under a Federation that supersedes the autonomous life of the monastic orders. Contemplative nuns are now obligated to participate in periodical meetings and information sessions that take them outside the cloister to different places. At these meetings, they are taught new teachings that are quite frankly tenants of liberal theology and Modernism such as the “synodal way of Saint Teresa” (which may be an oxymoron).
Ping
Traditional? Perhaps, but there appears to be something missing on that altar in the photo, namely the tabernacle, and therefore the consecrated Body of Christ!
bkmk
There are so many vacant churches in my state! (PA) It’s good to see there’s an active community, building instead of vanishing.
In our area the Elysburg Carmelites celebrated the TLM, but they moved out a while back; last I heard their property (Elysburg Monastery) was on the market. :(
A Sister Speaks: ‘Cor Orans is the Death-Knell of Carmel’
Fairfield Carmelite Sisters Wait and Pray for an End to Their Saga
I highly doubt that photo was taken in church were Mass is offered. Look at the size of that altar.
Later
Just looked it up. The convent in Elysburg PA sold for $1.6M, and they moved to Gettysburg area (a long drive) where they are building from scratch...and also seeking donations. Fairfieldcarmelites.org.
It would appear vocations are on the rise, at least that’s what they’re saying.
I highly doubt that photo was taken in church were Mass is offered. Look at the size of that altar.
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Yes I noticed that and you’re probably right but I couldn’t resist commenting because the apparent staging of the photo annoyed me.
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