Secular Discalced Carmelites celebrate 70th anniversary

Bishop Edward B. Scharfenberger is shown with members of the Our Lady of Mercy Community of Secular Discalced Carmelites after a Mass honoring the group’s 70th anniversary. (Photo provided)

Did you know about our “Pearl of Great Price?” Has it been hiding in plain sight where you didn’t notice? I can assure you it hasn’t been buried, but as a newcomer to the Albany Diocese, I just discovered it recently myself. Let me share it with you because, amazingly, it is turning 70 years old right under our noses! For any septuagenarian, this is cause for celebration.

Let me first ask, do you remember what you were doing in 1953? On the world scene, Joseph Stalin dies, Ernest Hemingway wins the Pulitzer Prize for “The Old Man and the Sea,” Queen Elizabeth II is crowned Queen of the United Kingdom, the first Chevrolet Corvette rolls off the assembly line and fighting in the Korean War ends.

In Schenectady, there was another important event of a very different kind. It was a group of people committed to a common vision, that of a “blossoming branch of Carmel … fruitful for the Glory of God and the salvation of souls.” It took place on Sept. 23, 1953, and it was known as the Canonical Erection into a Congregation of the Third Order Secular of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel. Now, 70 years later, in almost texting lingo we would simply refer to the group as “OCDS,” or the Secular Order of Discalced Carmelites, and known as the Our Lady of Mercy Community.

How did this come about? How was our own Albany Diocese graced with this pearl in its field? The nuns of the Discalced Carmelite Monastery of St. Teresa of Jesus in Schenectady (who relocated to the Diocese of Rochester in 2005) “ardently desired” an establishment of a secular Third Order for many years and “when this desire had found an echo in the hearts of several devout seculars, permission was obtained from the Most Rev. Bishop Edmund Gibbons” of the Albany Diocese and the Carmelite Provincial of the Province. The first group to be invested with the Habit of the Third Order, also known at the time as the Third Order Scapular, numbered 26. By the time of the inauguration of the Schenectady Chapter, there were 40 professed, 33 novices, and six postulants.

What defined their mission? First, the Secular Third Order — consisting of married and single men and women from all walks of life — was founded to give Glory to God, to honor Our Lady of Mount Carmel and to aid the Holy Mother Church by our prayers. Secondly, members must fully understand that Carmel is not a social organization. And, lastly, Secular Third Order membership is to be sought by prayer, sacrifice and example, not by desire for prestige or human respect. The Secular Third Order is for the individual sanctification of each member.

Today, after 70 years, our Albany Diocese’s Secular Order of Discalced Carmelites is still a vibrant community living out the mission of those first members, indeed that of the entire order. In addition to praying for seminarians, they also publish a monthly calendar of Albany diocesan priests for which to pray each day and which is posted in parishes for the lay faithful who wish to join in praying for our priests. 

On Saturday, Sept. 23, Bishop Edward B. Scharfenberger was the main celebrant at a Mass at St. Gabriel’s Church for the Our Lady of Mercy Community of Secular Discalced Carmelites in honor of their 70th anniversary of the Canonical Erection of this community. Concelebrants included the community’s spiritual assistant, Father Stephen Yusko, STL, and Father James Belogi, pastor of St. Gabriel’s Church. Join them in giving thanks to God and Our Lady of Mount Carmel for sustaining their community for these 70 years.

Earlier this month I was honored to be among the most recent aspirants to be “clothed with the Scapular” and admitted to formation in this wonderful community. I would invite you to inquire about getting to know them, pray for them, pray with them for priests, and if you share that “ardent desire” to be a part of the mission to “aid Holy Mother Church by our prayers,” contact the community through Laura Iwan at (518) 428-2084.