Carmelite Tertiaries

Traditional Carmelite spirituality is a way of life centered on contemplative prayer, silence, and interior union with God. Following the Teresian spirit of St. Teresa of Jesus and St. John of the Cross, Carmelites seek to live wholly for Christ through simplicity, detachment, and deep interior recollection.

This Carmelite spirituality is rooted in Traditional Catholicism and it invites the soul into a life of silence and deep interior prayer. It is a path of contemplation and detachment that seeks union with God in the hidden corners of the heart and amongst our daily duties. Here, we are called to sanctify the ordinary through stillness, simplicity, and a longing for the Eternal.

As Sr. Elizabeth of the Trinity said, “I have found heaven on earth, since heaven is God, and God is in my soul.”

The Discalced Carmelite (OCD) tradition emphasizes the hidden life of prayer and sacrifice as a means of sanctifying the world from within. Carmelite Tertiaries, or Lay members, share in this same spirit—living in the world yet striving for a life of prayerful intimacy with God, fidelity to the Church, and love of Our Lady, the Queen and Beauty of Carmel.

“A Carmelite’s day is a communing with God, from morning till night, and from night until morning. If He did not fill our cells and our cloisters, how empty they would be! But we see Him through all, for we bear Him within us, and our life on this earth is an anticipated Heaven.” – Sr. Elizabeth of the Trinity, OCD