The Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel

Our Lady of Mount Carmel is the title given to the Blessed Virgin as Patroness of the Carmelite Order.

History:  In 1 Kings 18, the prophet Elijah (spiritual father of the Carmelites) engaged in a dramatic confrontation, on Mount Carmel, with those worshipping the false God of Baal. Calling down fire from heaven, Elijah proved God’s power. Emulating Elijah’s spiritual practices of solitude, silence, poverty and prayer, while living in caves on Mount Carmel in the Holy Land, the first Carmelites dedicated their first chapel there to the Blessed Virgin Mary. The Blessed Virgin is the perfect model of the interior life of prayer and contemplation to which the Carmelites aspire.

On July 16, 1251, Saint Simon Stock, a leader in the Carmelite order, had a vision of the Virgin Mary holding the Scapular, which she gave to the Saint for the Carmelites to wear:

"Receive, My beloved son, this habit of thy order.  This shall be to thee, and to all Carmelites, a privilege that whosoever dies clothed in this shall never suffer eternal fire .... It shall be a sign of salvation, a protection in danger, and a pledge of peace.

Pope Benedict XVI said about the scapular:  “For those who wear it, it is a sign of filial abandonment to the protection of the Immaculate Virgin. In our battle against evil, may Mary our Mother wrap us in her mantle.”