#brownscapular — Public Fediverse posts

Quote of the day, 3 March: Pope John XXII

It behooveth thee to grant a favor and confirmation to my holy and devout Order of Carmel

For centuries the faithful who held a pious devotion to the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel believed in an apparition of the Blessed Virgin to Pope John XXII in Avignon. Based on that supposed apparition, the sovereign pontiff issued a Papal Bull, Sacratissimo uti culmine, dated 3 March 1322 from Avignon; it is in the text of the Bull that the pope mentions the apparition. The historical difficulty with this document lies in the fact that the Bull is mentioned nowhere prior to 1752, according to Joseph Hilgers.

Modern-day spiritual descendants of St. Simon Stock also have written and published volumes concerning the Brown Scapular as a sacramental. Former Carmelite Prior General Joseph Chalmers wrote, “In any case, the symbolism of the scapular as a sign of consecration to Mary, the Mother of Carmel, was and remains very important.”

Citing the Carmelite friar, Mathias of St. John, Father Chalmers added one important qualifier: “It would be far better to have holiness under a worldly habit than a worldly heart under a holy habit.” Fr. Chalmers concluded, “wearing the scapular is intended to be an outward reminder of what should be going on within” (Cf. Chalmers J 2009, Mary the Contemplative, Edizione Carmelitani, Rome).

Discalced Carmelite scholar Father Kieran Kavanaugh, O.C.D. discusses the historical problems head-on in his article, Brown Scapular: a Silent Devotion. He reviews the scapular as the habit of the Carmelites from their humble beginnings in the Holy Land to their spread throughout western Europe. In particular, Father Kieran describes the painstaking research undertaken by the Discalced Carmelites in defense of Carmelite Marian devotion following the Second Vatican Council, and how their careful documentation led to the restoration of the feast day of Saint Simon Stock to the Church’s liturgical calendar in 1979, in part thanks to the exhaustive research of Father Nilo Geagea, O.C.D.

But more important, Father Kieran explains with great precision where the Church stands today in regard to the Brown Scapular devotion:

“No mention is made of the vision of St. Simon Stock or of that of Pope John XXII in relation to the Sabbatine privilege, which promises that one will be released from Purgatory on the first Saturday after death.”

Nonetheless, the Carmelites have also been authorized to freely preach to the faithful that they can piously believe in the powerful intercession, merits, and suffrages of the Blessed Virgin, that she will help them even after their death, especially on Saturday, which is the day of the week particularly dedicated to Mary, if they have died in the grace of God and devoutly worn the scapular. But no mention is made of the “first” Saturday after their death.

One particular reflection that this great Discalced Carmelite scholar offers is rather consoling:

“If some day an historian were to prove beyond any reasonable doubt that there are no grounds to the Marian apparition to St. Simon Stock or the scapular promise, the scapular devotion would still maintain its value. The Church’s esteem of it as a sacramental, her appreciation of its meaning and of the good that has come about through its pious use on the part of the faithful is all that is needed.”

Perhaps Saint John Paul II summarized the Church’s teaching and the Carmelite scapular catechesis best in his 2001 Message to the Carmelite Family. The saint wrote, “the scapular is essentially a habit.”

For our readers who are history buffs, we have researched the Bull Sacratissimo uti culmine and found the text in Satolli’s Dictionnaire de Droit Canonique. An English translation is available from blogger Brother Hermenegild.

“The professed brethren of the said Order shall be loosed from guilt and punishment; and when they depart this world, they shall swiftly enter purgatory. I, the Mother, will graciously descend on the Saturday after their death; all whom I find there I shall release and lead to the holy mountain of eternal life.”

SACRATISSIMO UTI CULMINE

JOANNES EPISCOPUS SERVUS SERVORUM DEI,
Universis et singulis Christifidelibus, tam praesentibus quam futuris, praesentes literas inspecturis, salutem et apostolicam benedictionem.

Sacratissimo uti culmine Paradisi angelorum tam suavis et dulcis reperitur melodia, modulamine visionis, dum paterno Jesus Numini circumspicitur adumatus, dicendo: Domine, Ego et Pater unum sumus, et qui videt me, videt et Patrem meum, et angelorum chorus non desinit dicere: Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus; ita Synodus non cessat laudes effundere celsæ Virgini, dicendo Virgo, Virgo, Virgo, sis speculum nostrum pariter et exemplum. Quoniam munere munitur gratiarum, sicut sancta cantat Ecclesia: Gratia plena et Mater misericordiae. Sic ille mons reputatur de Carmelo Ordine cantibus extollendo, et hanc gratiarum Genitricem commendando et dicendo: Salve Regina, Mater misericordiæ et spes nostra.

Sic mihi flexis genibus supplicanti Virgo visa fuit Carmelita, sequentem effata sermonem:

0 Joannes, o Joannes, vicarie mei dilecti Filii, veluti a tuo te eripiam adversario, te Papam facio solemni dono Vicarium, meis coadjuvantibus supplicationibus, a dulcissimo meo Filio petens, quod gratiose obtinui, ita gratiam et amplam meo sancto ac devoto Carmelitarum Ordini confirmationem debeas praeconcedere, per Eliam et Eliseum in Monte Carmeli inchoato. Quod unusquisque professionem faciens, Regulam a meo servo Alberto, patriarcha, ordinatam observabit et inviolatam obtinebit, et per meum dilectum filium Innocentium approbatam, ut veri mei Filii Vicarius debeas in terris assentire, quod in cœlis meus statuit et ordinavit Filius; quod qui in sancta perseverabit obedientia, paupertate et castitate, vel qui sanctum intrabit Ordinem, salvabitur; et si alii, devotionis causa, in sanctam ingrediantur Religionem, sancti Habitus signum ferentes, appellantes se Confratres et Consorores mei Ordinis prænominati, liberentur et absolvantur a tertia eorum peccatorum portione, a die quo præfatum Ordinem intrabunt, castitatem, si vidua est, promittendo; virginitatis, si est virgo, fidem præstando; si est conjugata, inviolati conservationem matrimonii adhibendo, ut sancta mater imperat Ecclesia.

Fratres proféssi dicti Ordinis supplicio solvantur et culpa, et die quo ab isto se culo recedunt, properato gradu accelerant purgatorium, ego Mater gratiose descendam sabbato post eorum obitum, et quot inveniam in purgatorio liberabo, et eos in Montem sanctum vitæ æternæ reducam.

Verum quod ipsi Confratres et Consorores te neantur Horas dicere Canonicales, ut opus fuerit, secundum Regulam datam ab Alberto; illi, qui ignari sunt, debeant vitam jejunam ducere diebus quos sacra jubet Ecclesia, nisi, necessitatis causa, alicui essent traditi impedimento; mercurio ac sabbato debeant se a carnibus abstinere, præterquam in mei Filii Nativitate. Et hoc dicto, evanuit ista sancta visio.

Istam ergo sanctam Indulgentiam accepto, roboro et in terris confirmo, sicut, propter merita Virginis Matris, gratiose Jesus-Christus concessit in coelis. Nulli ergo omnino hominum liceat hanc paginam nostræ Indulgentiæ, seu statuti, et ordinationis irritare, vel ei ausu temerario contraire. Si quis autem hoc attentare præsumpserit, indignationem Omnipotentis Dei, et Beatorum apostolorum Petri et Pauli se noverit incursurum.

Datum Avenione, tertia die Martii, Pontificatus nostri anno sexto

Quote of the day, 8 May: St. John Paul II

Was Saint John Paul II a Carmelite?

Some years ago, a lively discussion arose online about whether Saint John Paul II was formally affiliated with the Discalced Carmelite Order.

In a 2001 message to the Carmelite family, the Holy Father wrote:

“I too have worn the Scapular of Carmel over my heart for a long time! Because I love the heavenly Mother we all share, whose protection I constantly experience, I hope that this Marian year will help all … to grow in her love and to radiate to the world the presence of this Woman of silence and prayer…”
— Message to the Carmelite Family, 25 March 2001

When this question of official affiliation was raised in the Carmelites Unite Facebook group, a friar of the Krakow Province, Father Włodzimierz Tochmański, OCD—a friar with deep knowledge of the Discalced Carmelite Secular Order in Poland—responded that Karol Józef Wojtyła was never canonically affiliated with the Third Order of the Teresian Carmel.

However, Fr. Tochmański emphasized the Pope’s deep spiritual affiliation with Carmel, akin to the bond shared by members of the Scapular Confraternity.

Biographers also highlight the formative role of the Discalced Carmelite friars in Wadowice, the Pope’s hometown. Although St. Raphael Kalinowski, OCD, had died in 1908—twelve years before Karol Wojtyła was born—his legacy continued to shape Carmelite life in Wadowice for decades. As a young priest, Wojtyła studied in Rome, and in 1948 he successfully defended his doctoral dissertation at the Angelicum: “The Doctrine of Faith in St. John of the Cross.”

St. John Paul II and the Carmelite Scapular

In his homily for the Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel on 16 July 1988, delivered at the Alpini pilgrimage Mass on Mount Adamello, the Pope spoke warmly of the Scapular tradition:

“It is not the time to dwell on the particular devotion to Our Lady of Mount Carmel. I will only cite a few words of Pius XII, who wrote in an authoritative document: ‘No one surely is ignorant of how much the love for the most blessed Mother of God contributes to enlivening the Catholic faith and to amending lives, especially through those expressions of devotion which, more than others, seem to enrich minds with supernatural doctrine and move souls to the devout practice of the Christian life. Among these must be mentioned the devotion of the Sacred Scapular of Carmel, which, by its simplicity, adapts to the character of everyone and is widely spread among the Christian faithful, with abundant spiritual fruits.’”
— Homily on Mount Adamello, 16 July 1988

Just over a week later, in his Angelus address of 24 July 1988, the Pope returned to the theme:

“In Carmel, and in every deeply Carmelite soul, an intense life of communion and closeness with the Blessed Virgin flourishes. This becomes a ‘new way’ to live for God and continue here on earth the love of Jesus the Son for His Mother Mary.”
— Angelus, 24 July 1988

He also affirmed the Scapular as “a particular grace” passed on by Mary, recalling the tradition tied to St. Simon Stock, and described it as: “A sign of affiliation with the Carmelite Order… a means of tender and filial Marian devotion.”

A Personal Word

In a visit to the Carmelite parish of Santa Maria in Traspontina in Rome on 10 February 1991, Pope John Paul II offered a personal memory:

“I lived as a child in a town and parish where there was also a Carmelite monastery and convent, where I learned this great Carmelite tradition… This tradition, rooted in the Old Testament with the prophet Elijah, renewed in the Middle Ages, has come down to us—even here near the Vatican—and to this Pope, who has been connected to it since his earliest youth.”
— Address at Santa Maria in Traspontina, 10 February 1991

He closed with a blessing and a wish for all present:

“I wish you every blessing as you continue your journey under the protection of Our Lady of Mount Carmel and her Scapular, as we see in the Carmelite Third Order.”

Saint John Paul II

Translation from the Italian text is the blogger’s own work product and may not be reproduced without permission.

Featured image: Brown Scapular worn by Saint John Paul II, a gift to the Discalced Carmelite parish in Wadowice, Poland. Image credit: Discalced Carmelite Order (Used by permission)

⬦ Reflection Question ⬦
How might I grow closer to Carmel’s spirit of silence, prayer, and Marian devotion in my own life?
⬦ Join the conversation in the comments.

#BrownScapular #DiscalcedCarmelite #OCDS #Poland #StJohnPaulII #StRaphaelKalinowski #Wadowice

Quote of the day, 19 November: St. Raphael Kalinowski

We should praise and venerate the one who is the refuge of sinners here on earth and in heaven. We should love the Blessed Virgin, because she is the mother of us all: “Here is your mother.” She is a loving mother, because she not only carries us in her bosom, but with Jesus loves us as her children, and helps us in all our needs. She is a gracious and merciful mother for all sinners who draw near to her, a powerful mother because God gave his riches into her keeping. She wants to be loved as mother and says to us: “My son, give me your heart, a heart that is loving, grace filled, focused on my Son; this is what I expect from you first of all.” … Come, Mary, rule over us and direct us. As breathing is not only a sign of life, but also its cause, so the name of Mary should be constantly on the lips of the servants of God, it is a sign that the person is alive.

SAINT RAPHAEL KALINOWSKI

During the special congress of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints that met on March 18, 1980, to discuss Raphael Kalinowski’s heroic virtues, the first “relator” recalled in his vote the deep Marian devotion of the Servant of God, evoking his maxim, “Mary always and in everything.”

The Virgin Mary clearly played a very special role in the saint’s life and occupies a unique place in his spirituality. His Marian spirituality corresponds fully to the directives the Council offered us sixty years after the death of the saint. Contemporary Mariology, following the direction Vatican II marked out emphasized Mary’s greatness as mother of Christ and super-eminent member and mother of the Church. 

The theology of our times, therefore, treats the figure of the Blessed Virgin Mary in a Christological and ecclesiological context. Saint Raphael Kalinowski’s Mariology had such an orientation. His Marian spirituality does not stop with the figure of Mary, but through her leads to Christ, living and working in the Church, his Mystical Body. Let us briefly review the principal aspects of this spirituality:

1. His conversion took place after college on account of Mary, and led Joseph Kalinowski to Christ through the sacramental ministry of the Church; [“With her help, I have been able to build up my interior life. I recognized the value of familiar religious principles and, finally, I turned toward them.”]
2. His entrance into Carmel, the order of Mary, had as its goal to serve Christ more closely and to work for the unity of his Church; [“Precisely this Order should make the Eastern schismatics return to the breast of the Church of Rome.”]
3. The testimony of a religious life in imitation of Mary—“the Book where the eternal Word of God, Christ the Lord, is read to the world”—is confirmed and blessed by the Church;
4. Fidelity to the religious vocation of the Brothers [and Sisters] of the Blessed Virgin Mary does not consist of a sentimental love for her, but in “attending to her affairs,” [“We are her work and she does not cease calling us to be her ministers, to take care of her affairs.”] seeing in her the secure guide to Christ, in other words:

• Accepting and accomplishing—like her—the will of God, contemplating and preaching his Word made flesh in Christ Jesus, author of our salvation, of which the Christ is now the sacrament;
  
• Spiritually directing the souls of his brothers and sisters, pointing out to them the road ad Jesum per Mariam [to Jesus through Mary] or, better yet, ad Jesum cum Maria [to Jesus with Mary], taking as a base the common faith of the Church in her role as mediatrix of grace until all of the “old man” is stripped off and they put on the armor of the “new man”;
• Propagating the scapular devotion—a sign of salvation and the Mother’s gift—a sacramental of the Church that helps sanctify every moment of life and attain the salvation accomplished by Christ.

In the final analysis, Mary always and in everything, but inasmuch as she guides us to Christ and brings us to communion with him in his Church, “to make us living stones of this Church, willing servants of our brothers and sisters on this earth and, after death, participants in God’s glory forever.”

Szczepan T. Praskiewicz, O.C.D.

St. Raphael Kalinowski: An Introduction to His Life and Spirituality
II. Elements of his spirituality (excerpt)

Praskiewicz OCD, S 2016, Saint Raphael Kalinowski: An Introduction to his Life and Spirituality, ICS Publications, Washington DC.

Tierney, T  2016,  Saint Raphael Kalinowski: Apprenticed to Sainthood in Siberia,  Balboa Press,  Bloomington, IN

Featured image: Virgin and Child is an oil on wood painting by Anthony Van Dyck (Flemish, 1599–1641) executed around 1620. It comes from the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (Public domain).

#BlessedVirginMary #BrownScapular #Christ #conversion #MotherOfTheChurch #StRaphaelKalinowski #VirginMary

At no better moment, out of the mouths of the religious, could the plea to Mary resound that their Jesus, who is now veiled from their sight, will someday appear unveiled after they have departed from this place of exile: Et Jesum benedictum fructum ventris tui nobis post hoc exilium ostende. And reveal to us, after this exile, Jesus, the blessed fruit of your womb.

All now stand before the altar of Mary. The Blessed Sacrament is placed on the repositorium, above which the statue of Mary glimmers in the light. Her hands hold the Scapular, the promise of her protection.

Saint Titus Brandsma

Saturday Evening in the Church of the Carmelites (excerpt)

Note: We thank the Titus Brandsma Instituut for providing this translation by Susan Verkerk-Wheatley and Anne-Marie Bos of Brandsma’s fine essay,  ‘Zaterdagavond in de kerk der Carmelieten’, which appeared in the review Carmelrozen, Vol. IV, August 1915, p. 93-96.

Featured image: Father Brandsma preaches at the Marian Congress in Nijmegen, Holland in 1920. At that time he was teaching philosophy and mathematics to the Carmelite students in Oss. Photo credit: Nederlands Carmelitaans Instituut (used by permission).

https://carmelitequotes.blog/2024/05/17/mdj2024-ep18/

#BlessedSacrament #BrownScapular #Carmelites #exile #friars #Jesus #promise #protection #SalveRegina #StTitusBrandsma #statue #VirginMary

Carmel seeks to gaze upon God and love God with mind and heart. What Mary represents is the soul itself. As the soul is united to Christ, so Carmel is hidden in Mary. For Carmel, Mary is, beyond any doubt, the infinitely admirable and lovable Mother, the all-merciful Mother, but deeper than this, she is the one who was chosen and formed by God to be the Mother of the Savior; she is the purest, highest, and most perfect expression of the soul that is open to the divine action and lives in Mary’s light and in Mary’s love. She is, par excellence, the contemplative soul.

This mystic and filial intuition was to be confirmed in the centuries that were to come. In a critical hour, [according to tradition] our Lady herself answered the trusting, insistent prayer of Saint Simon Stock. She appeared to him, holding in her hand the scapular of the Order, and said: “This is the privilege that I give you and all Carmel’s children. Whoever dies clothed with this habit will be saved.” In this way she extended, in visible fashion, her special protection over the Order that has always called itself her own.

Paul-Marie of the Cross, O.C.D.

III. The Rule and Its Spirit: Brothers and Sisters of Our Lady

The Carmelites—Ordo fratrum Beatae Virginis Mariae de Monte Carmelo—are the guardians of devotion to the Brown Scapular, the Scapular Confraternity, and of the Rite for the Blessing of and Enrolment in the Scapular of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel. Search their official website where you will find more than 1500 mentions of the scapular… explore!

of the Cross, P-M, Payne, S 1997, Carmelite Spirituality in the Teresian Tradition, ICS Publications, Washington DC.

https://carmelitequotes.blog/2024/05/15/quote-of-the-day-16-may-paul-marie-of-the-cross-o-c-d/

#BrownScapular #Carmelites #devotion #inspiration #OurLadyOfMountCarmel #PaulMarieOfTheCross #ScapularConfraternity #spirituality #StSimonStock

Do you wear the Brown Scapular? On 3 March 1322 Pope John the 22nd issued the Papal Bull that decreed the Sabbatine Privilege from Avignon. Or did he? Historians have cast doubt on this claim. Visit our blog to learn why the historians argue a moot point here.
👉🏼 https://carmelitequotes.blog 👈🏼

#carmelites #brownscapular #sabbatineprivilege #catholic #avignonpapacy #ourladyofmountcarmel

Do you wear the Brown Scapular? On 3 March 1322 Pope John the 22nd issued the Papal Bull that decreed the Sabbatine Privilege from Avignon. Or did he? Historians have cast doubt on this claim. Visit our blog to learn why the historians argue a moot point here.
👉🏼 https://carmelitequotes.blog 👈🏼

#carmelites #brownscapular #sabbatineprivilege #catholic #avignonpapacy #ourladyofmountcarmel

Do you wear the Brown Scapular? On 3 March 1322 Pope John the 22nd issued the Papal Bull that decreed the Sabbatine Privilege from Avignon. Or did he? Historians have cast doubt on this claim. Visit our blog to learn why the historians argue a moot point here.
👉🏼 https://carmelitequotes.blog 👈🏼

#carmelites #brownscapular #sabbatineprivilege #catholic #avignonpapacy #ourladyofmountcarmel

St. Raphael Kalinowski received the Discalced Carmelite habit on 26 November 1877 and made his religious vows on the same date in 1878. Visit our #blog to read an excerpt from his conference for the Carmelite friars in Wadowice: “Mother of God, Hope of the World.”
❤ https://carmelitequotes.blog

#StRaphaelKalinowski #OnThisDay #BrownScapular #DiscalcedCarmelites #friars #VirginMary #MotherOfGod #novice #religious #vocation #vows #Catholic #spirituality #Carmelite #Poland

St. Raphael Kalinowski received the Discalced Carmelite habit on 26 November 1877 and made his religious vows on the same date in 1878. Visit our #blog to read an excerpt from his conference for the Carmelite friars in Wadowice: “Mother of God, Hope of the World.”
❤ https://carmelitequotes.blog

#StRaphaelKalinowski #OnThisDay #BrownScapular #DiscalcedCarmelites #friars #VirginMary #MotherOfGod #novice #religious #vocation #vows #Catholic #spirituality #Carmelite #Poland

St. Raphael Kalinowski received the Discalced Carmelite habit on 26 November 1877 and made his religious vows on the same date in 1878. Visit our #blog to read an excerpt from his conference for the Carmelite friars in Wadowice: “Mother of God, Hope of the World.”
❤ https://carmelitequotes.blog

#StRaphaelKalinowski #OnThisDay #BrownScapular #DiscalcedCarmelites #friars #VirginMary #MotherOfGod #novice #religious #vocation #vows #Catholic #spirituality #Carmelite #Poland