Tradition holds that the Blessed Mother appeared to Saint Simon Stock on July 16, 1251. Saint Simon Stock strived to lead the newly formed Carmelite Order and Mary offered to him a brown scapular that became part of the Carmelite’s habit. The Blessed Mother promised to Saint Simon Stock that anyone who died wearing the scapular would be saved. Devotion to Our Lady of Mount Carmel has focused on the Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.
It should be noted that the first Carmelites were Christians living in hermitages on Mount Carmel in the Holy Land during the 12th and 13th centuries. They built a chapel there and dedicated it to the Blessed Mother.
Carmelite History & Charism
“One of the things that is common across all the Orders, branches, divisions, and flavors of Carmelites is the prominent place given to Mary, the mother of Jesus. That first group of hermits who became a community on Mount Carmel gathered for prayer in a chapel dedicated to ‘Our Lady of the Place’…and since ‘the place’ was indeed Mount Carmel, the group became known as the Brothers of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.
Mary is revered in our Carmelite tradition as a woman of prayer, of contemplation. She is also a woman who built first the Holy Family, and later built up the community of the disciples. . .Her entire life, certainly, was a gift of service to others, and indeed to the whole world. Thus Mary in herself models for us the three pillars of the Carmelite charism: prayer, community, and service.
Mary is often portrayed in art as ‘Our Lady of Mount Carmel’, dressed in a brown habit with white cloak and looking indeed very ‘Carmelite’. She holds the child Jesus in one arm, and from the other drapes a small piece of brown cloth, the scapular. This small scapular is derived from the scapular cloth worn by Carmelite religious originally to protect their habit while they were at work…in a sense, a kind of apron. It serves as a constant reminder that our spiritual journey is lived out in the everyday, working-world events of our daily life. The brown scapular today is a symbol of belonging, to one degree or another, to the Carmelite family. It is held as a sign of personal devotion to the Lady of the Place, to the Carmelite order, and also is a recognition of Mary’s love and protection of us as her children who were given to her at the foot of the cross.
In the words of what is effectively our Carmelite ‘theme song’ (the Flos Carmeli), Mary herself is the flower of Carmel, and as Titus Brandsma wrote: ‘The devotion to Mary is one of the most delightful flowers in Carmel’s garden.’”
SOURCE: Snow, O.Carm., Glenn. Foundation Stones: A Primer in Carmelite History & Charism. Carmelite Media, 2015.
O Most Holy Mary of Mount Carmel,
pray for me.
You watch over those who follow
the Gospel of your Son
with a mother’s loving care.
Look now upon me and cover me
with the embrace of your special protection.
Strengthen me when I am weak.
Enlighten the darkness of my mind
with your wisdom.
Increase in me the virtues of
faith, hope and charity.
As you fulfilled all of our hopes and dreams
as members of the Church,
help me now to show forth the love of
Jesus in my life.
O Mother of Carmel,
comfort and protect me all the days of my life.