The Unselfconscious Medieval Carmelites
At the beginning of the 13th century with the reception of the Rule of Saint Albert, The Order of Carmel was officially born. The men who were its first members looked at life and God from within the medieval “worldview”: God and the Church were real, objective, unquestioned Truths, as much a part of everyday life as the inexorable succession of night and day; life was short and the goal clear – to gain the prize of Eternal Life.
The 21st century Christian carries unseen scars from the vicissitudes of the ensuing centuries, such as the Enlightenment and the Protestant, Industrial and Technological Revolutions. What can those pioneers in the Carmelite way of life offer to post-modern man? Perhaps simply the unselfconsciousness they had in regard to God, exemplified in their eremitical life on Mount Carmel: burning themselves out in prayer and praise for the glory of God and the honor of His Immaculate Mother.
They knew that reality exists outside oneself, not in a construct within oneself that must be figured out or put together. God Himself, the Origin, Mover and Destiny of all created things, gives meaning to all things and holds all things in existence. In this knowledge, they were free to forget themselves and fling their existence gratefully back into His hands with praise, certain that in sacrificing it to Him, they would find it again, fulfilled beyond their greatest desires and dreams.
Those medieval men did not need to go within themselves to figure it all out, precisely because Our Lord Jesus Christ came out of Himself, so to speak, in order to reveal Himself to us and thus to reveal all Truth. His Virgin Mother, the epitome of self-sacrifice and surrender, did not try to make God fit into her own subjective “truth,” but let Him instead lift her out of herself, gave Him permission to be God in her life – indeed, in her womb – and allowed Him to write the pages. The first Carmelites followed her example closely. Leaving all behind, they burned themselves out for God, losing their lives for Him and thus finding life in Him.
Next Month: The Unselfconscious Medieval Carmelites, Part II
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