Vocation and Promise
The Seculars' vocation is to live the Carmelite spirituality as Seculars and not as mere imitators of Carmelite monastic life . With the Friars and Nuns, they assist the Order in drawing the Church into an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ and His Mother, Mary, Mother and Queen of Carmel. They are apostles of contemplative prayer, but also live intense lives of charity in their common occupations.
They profess a promise to the Order patterned on the monastic vows which guides their life. The Promise is to live according to the Constitution and to live the evangelical counsels of chastity, poverty, and obedience and the beatitudes adapted to their lay state of life.
Spiritually mature members receiving the recommendation of the local council of their community and the approval of their provincial superior are permitted to profess vows of chastity and obedience to their community, which are strictly personal and do not translate into a separate class of membership.
Read more about this topic: Secular Order Of Discalced Carmelites
Famous quotes containing the words vocation and/or promise:
“Men are born to write. The gardener saves every slip, and seed, and peach-stone: his vocation is to be a planter of plants. Not less does the writer attend his affair. Whatever he beholds or experiences, comes to him as a model, and sits for its picture. He counts it all nonsense that they say, that some things are undescribable. He believes that all that can be thought can be written, first or last; and he would report the Holy Ghost, or attempt it.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“We grew up founding our dreams on the infinite promise of American advertising. I still believe that one can learn to play the piano by mail and that mud will give you a perfect complexion.”
—Zelda Fitzgerald (1900–1948)