Originally posted by Orthodox Catholic:
Dear Friends,
I think the Third Order idea is an excellent one that would be most beneficial in the Eastern Catholic Churches!
(It is interesting that St Benedict approved of "Oblates" rather than "Third Orders" - a Third Order often has a separate rule for lay confraternities affiliated with an Order but the Rule of St Benedict itself is what an Oblate accepts, just as Benedictine monastics do).
The distinction between the first, second, and third orders came from a later date. It was the Servites who started to use the term.
What turned me off originally with that is the notion, either popular or told me by those who urged the devotion to me, that one will go to heaven if one but wears the scapular all the time etc.
But the scapular cannot be an opportunity to "relax" one's spiritual struggle - and spirituality is always a struggle. I find that whole idea to be rather spiritually dangerous.
I do like the contemporary efforts by Carmelites to recast the scapular devotion within the context of either overt Third Order membership or else another form of connection to the Carmelite Order where those enrolled dedicate themselves to the ideals of the Order, to praying the Horologion/Divine Office and to the lectio divina of the Scriptures and the Fathers.
Alex
I believe what turned you off is the popular notion about the brown scapular. The Congregation for Divine Worship and for the Discipline of the Sacraments has issued on November 29, 1996 the
Doctrinal Statement on the Brown Scapular [
geocities.com]
Here in the Philippines, the Third Order Carmelites takes care of the spiritual formation of the members of the Scapular Confraternity and those who are just devotees to Our Lady of Mount Carmel.
I admit that there is a lack of understanding about the Brown Scapular and that there has been a laxity in giving explanation about it in the past. And this gave rise to the wrong notions you have mentioned.
Next month, our TOC community will be visiting a
lay monastic community [
caryana.org] which follows the Rule of St. Benedict.
There is nothing contrary between the Benedictine and Carmelite spirituality. When Saint Teresa of Avila was about to die, she exclaimed "I am a daughter of the Church" and not "I am a daughter of the Carmelites."
Regards,
Ruel
PS...
The article "Eastern Reflections on the Rule of Carmel" was originally published in the OCD Curia website but was removed when the order made some renovation on the site last 2002. I reposted it in our
region\'s [
geocities.com] website because the article is very good.
(Yes, including a liturgical umbrella from Ethiopia!)