Spirituality

John of the Cross’ wisdom for holiday stress — ‘Nada’

On: December 2, 2025

The holiday season promises joy but often delivers exhaustion. Our calendars overflow with obligations: parties to attend, gifts to buy, meals to prepare, decorations to arrange, family expectations to meet. We tell ourselves that if we just manage everything perfectly,…

John of the Cross: When Ministry Feels Like Night

By: Carmelite Administrator

On: December 2, 2025

In: Spirituality

Every person engaged in ministry — whether ordained priest, religious, lay catechist, youth worker, spiritual director, or parish volunteer — eventually encounters a season when the work feels dark. The programmes that once energised you now drain you. Prayer feels…

Advent: Waiting in Darkness with John of the Cross

By: Carmelite Administrator

On: December 2, 2025

In: Spirituality

Advent begins as the year dies. The days shorten, darkness encroaches, and nature enters its dormancy. The Church invites us into this darkness not with dread but with expectation, asking us to wait for the coming Light. For St John…

The ‘O Antiphons’: A Countdown to Christ’s Coming

By: Carmelite Administrator

On: November 17, 2025

In: Spirituality

From December 17 to 23, the Church prays seven ancient hymns known as the ‘O Antiphons’. Sung at Vespers before and after the Magnificat, these brief invocations carry the longing of centuries. Each begins with the cry “O”, and addresses…

Advent with the Carmelite Mystics

By: Carmelite Administrator

On: November 17, 2025

In: Spirituality

Advent calls us into the darkness of winter to wait for the coming Light. For the great Carmelite mystics, this season speaks to them of their lived experience of faith – the tension between absence and presence, longing and fulfilment,…

Christ the King and Carmelite Surrender

By: Carmelite Administrator

On: November 17, 2025

In: Spirituality

The Solemnity of Christ the King stands as the Church’s annual proclamation of a sovereignty that confounds all earthly power. We celebrate a King whose throne was a cross, whose crown was woven from thorns, whose royal proclamation was “It…

‘Meditations on the Seven O Antiphons’: A 7-Week Advent Retreat

By: Carmelite Administrator

On: November 3, 2025

In: Spirituality

Make Advent this year a patient, prayerful journey toward the Christ who comes. Each week we rest in one of the seven O Antiphons: short, jewel-like titles of the Saviour that have shaped Christian prayer for a thousand years. Through…

Teresa’s ‘Four Waters of Prayer’ – A Self-Assessment tool

By: Carmelite Administrator

On: November 1, 2025

In: Spirituality

St Teresa of Avila, the great Carmelite reformer and Doctor of the Church, offers one of the most profound descriptions of the soul’s growth in prayer through her doctrine of the four waters. In her autobiography (Chapters 11-22), she likens…

‘One Dark Night…’ – An Advent Preparation

By: Carmelite Administrator

On: November 1, 2025

In: Spirituality

One dark night,
fired with love’s urgent longings
– ah the sheer grace! –
I went out unseen,
my house being now all stilled.St John of the Cross’ poem “One Dark Night” narrates the soul’s journey through spiritual purification to…

Teresa of Avila: Woman of Courage

By: Carmelite Administrator

On: November 1, 2025

In: Spirituality

As we journey through our own spiritual lives, we often find ourselves seeking guides, companions who have walked the treacherous and glorious paths of the interior life before us. We look for figures whose struggles mirror our own and whose…