The origin of the Order in Spain remains shrouded in mist, though the researches of such scholars as Frs. Otger Steggink, Pablo Garrido and Balbino Velasco Bayon, have done much to clarify the problem.

According to a 16th century English Carmelite, the General Chapter of London in 1254 decreed the founding of houses of the Order in Spain. In fact a number of houses are known to have been in existence not long after that date. The impetus for this movement came from the Southern French Provinces of Province and Aquitaine, part of which lay under the crown of Aragon.

A Province of Spain is listed in the General Chapter of 1281. In 1354 Catalonia was separated from the Province of Spain, and in 1416 the latter was divided into Aragon and Castile. The Carmelite Order in Spain received its definitive form in 1498 when Andalusia was separated from Castile. Aragon took precedence over the others as the most ancient. In the 18th century it reached its maximum development with 24 convents and 745 members.

After the suppression of 1835 the Aragonese convents of Onda and Caudete with Jerez de la Frontera in Andalusia revived the Province of Spain in 1890. By 1906 Aragon, under the title Arago-Valentine, was again a Province with 50 members. The Province suffered a set-back in the Civil War (1936-1939), when 28 of its members were killed, but it has since grown and expanded across the seas to Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic.

After the short-lived mission at Merthyr Tydvil in Wales, the Irish Carmelite Province undertook a foundation in far-off Australia, to which Ireland in the past had contributed many inhabitants in the persons of political exiles. Among the deportees to Botany Bay after the Rebellion of 1798, were members of the Third Order or Scapular Confraternity, James Dempsey and John Butler, who arrived in Sydney in 1802. The former was a religious leader in the priestless Catholic community and supervised the construction of the first St. Mary's cathedral. A Carmelite priest, Fr. Samuel Coote, was briefly active in Tasmania, 1824-1825.

In 1881 the Irish Province accepted the invitation of the bishop of Adelaide to undertake the spiritual care of the Catholics in Gawler. The original community consisted of Frs. Joseph Butler (prior), Brocard Leybourne, Ignatius Carr, Patrick Shaffrey and Hilarion Byrne. In 1902, Gawler was abandoned for Port Adelaide; in 1906, the Carmelites moved into Port Melbourne and Middle Park, when these became parishes. These three houses, together with the noviciate in Albert Park, founded in 1928, were constituted a Commissariat General in 1930. Fr. Francis Power was named the first Commissary.

After a house of studies had been erected in 1937, all the elements of autonomy were present; in 1948, the Province of Australia under the title of Our Lady Help of Christians became a reality with 41 members in 7 houses. Fr. Joseph Nugent headed the new Province. In 2001 the Australian Province accepted responsibility for the Carmelite presence in Timor Leste and for the Mission Parish of Zumalai.

At present the Province of Australia and Timor Leste has about 60 religious working in Australia, Timor Leste, Italy and United States.

For further information: Province of Australia and Timor Leste
Provincial Office:

Carmelite Priory
75 Wright Street
MIDDLE PARK, VIC 3206
Tel. 03-9686 3455
Fax 03-9699 1944

The first house was opened in Andalusia in Gibraleón (1306 - 1320) by the Infantes de la Cerda. From there, the Carmelites made a foundation in (1358) under the patronage of King D. Pedro I. Later on, in the vicinity of the capital, they opened the convent of Escacena del Campo (Huelva) in 1416, and Ecija (Seville) in 1425. In 1498 these four houses were detached from the Province of Castile, to form a new Province.

Even though it was the youngest Province in the Iberian region, Betica very soon began to show signs of its vitality. By the middle of the 16th century it had sixteen houses. Statistics from 1674 show that there were 868 members in the Province as well as 350 Carmelite nuns, living in ten monasteries. The Province had twenty five houses at that time, which is the same number it had when the Suppression began in 1835.

With the closure of the houses and the expulsion of the religious, only a tiny number remained at the time of the Restoration, a process which began in Palma de Mallorca towards the year 1877 and ended in April 1880 with the official opening of Jerez de la Frontera, the first of the restored Carmels in Spain. After this, and not without great effort, the houses of Onda (Castellón), Caudete (Albacete), Hinojosa del Duque (Córdoba), Osuna (Seville) were opened. At the General Chapter in 1889 the Province of Spain was erected under the title of The Most Holy Name of Mary.

This young Province began the restoration of the Order in Brazil. Despite many great difficulties its members succeeded in reacquiring various houses which the Order would surely otherwise have lost (São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Recife, Bahía). In 1906 the Spanish Province was divided into two Provinces, Betica and Arago-Valentine. Both Provinces continued the work of restoration in Brazil. In later years they were joined by members of the Dutch Province who went to work in Rio de Janeiro.

The Betica Province continued to contribute to the restoration of other Provinces such as the Polish Province, between 1925 and 1939, and Portugal between 1930 and 1954. The Civil War (1936 - 1939) had a very cruel impact on parts of Andalusia. The Province lost ten of its members, whose cause for beatification is now under way. With the Province re-established, in 1954 the first group of religious were sent to Venezuela which today is a promising Commissariat. In 2000 a new mission was opined in Burkina Faso.

At present the Province of Betica has about 90 religious working in Spain, Venezuela, Burkina Faso and Italy.

For further information: Province of Betica

Web site of the Mission inf Venezuela

Provincial Office:

Padres Carmelitas
Plaza del Buen Suceso, 5
41004 SEVILLA
Tel. 95-4211823 (Comun.)
95-4213157 (Provincial)

This Province is honoured by the fact that it is the Province of two great saints of the Church: Teresa of Jesus and John of the Cross. It was founded in 1416, when the Province of Spain was split into the two Provinces of Aragon and Castile. It was this Province which preserved the title and location of the ancient Province of Spain up to 1469. It included the convents of Toledo, Requena, Avila, Salamanca, San Pablo de la Moraleja, Santa Maria de los Valles, Gibraleon, Seville and Escacena, and, a little later, Ecija. In 1498 the four last mentioned houses were separated from Castile to form the new Province of Andalusia (Betica). The same thing had happened previously in 1425 when the convents of Moura and Lisbon, which belonged to Castile, gave rise to the Province of Portugal.

The Province remained relatively small, a situation which led St. Teresa to say that it was about to disappear. But later events have shown that the fear of St. Teresa was not well-founded, for in the years 1550-1557, the Prior General, Nicholas Audet, had included the Province among those which had accepted completely his reform, and which consequently grew in number of convents and religious, and, during the closing decades of the XVIIth century and through the following century, enjoyed its period of grand splendour. In the schools of the Province, which were affiliated to the Universities of Toledo, Salamanca, Alcala de Henares and Valladolid, many religious flourished in wisdom and virtue. Among these we recall especially the great mystic, Miguel de la Fuente and the great theologians, Pedro Cornejo de Pedrosa, Juan Bautista de Lezana and Luis Pérez de Castro. This Province, which through the centuries has given to the Order two Priors General, Juan González Feijoo de Villalobos (1692-1698) and Manuel Regidor y Brihuega (1825-1831), and fourteen bishops to the Church, also included the monasteries of nuns in Avila, Fontiveros and Piedrahita, founded at the end of the XVth and the beginning of the XVIth centuries. There were also two more monasteries of nuns founded in the XVIIth century in Madrid.

As was the case with all religious in Spain, the Province of Castile was suppressed by the government in 1835. The restoration of the Province began in 1948, when the Commissariat of Castile was established with houses in El Henar, Salamanca and Lomas de Zamora (Argentina). To these were added the houses in Madrid and Valladolid. The monasteries of nuns in Madrid (Maravillas), Piedrahita and Fontiveros, which managed to survive the decree of exclaustration, also belonged to the Commissariat. In 1984, Castile regained its status as a Province.

Some of the foundations of the Province of Catalonia are among the oldest in the Order. The early history of what is now the Province, involving Southern France, Northern Spain and the Balearic Islands, reflects the complicated political situation of the time. In 1336 the Vicariate of Perpignan was erected from the Province of Spain, also called Aragon. In 1339 it appears as the Vicariate of Perpignan and Majorca. In 1342 it was raised to the status of Province with the name Majorca; from 1354 it bore its present name. Together with the other houses in Spain, the Province was suppressed by the secular authorities in 1835.

In modern times Catalan Carmelites had an important part in the restoration of the Order in Spain: Palma de Mallorca (1875), Onda (1879), Jerez de la Frontera (1880). The Province of Spain was reinstated in 1890 and with the restoration and foundation of convents in other parts and was once more divided into the traditional Provinces. In 1932 the Commissariat General of Catalonia was separated from the Province of Arago-Valentine; in 1950 it once again became a Province.

The Province of Catalonia assisted in the restoration of the Order's Provinces in Brazil (Rio de Janeiro, Bahia, Pernambuco), in Poland and in France.
At present the Province of Catalonia has about 40 religious working in Catalonia (Spain), United States, Venezuela, Kenya, Italy and France.

For further information: Province of Catalonia
Provincial Office:

Pares Carmelites
C/ S. Hermenegild, 13
08006 BARCELONA
Tel. 93-2003931/93-2098945
Fax 93-4 144723

England was one of the earliest sites of the Carmelites in Europe. Their coming exemplifies the classic scenario of the Carmelites fleeing from the Holy Land (Israel) under the protection of the crusaders; in fact it was the crusader, Sir Richard Grey of Codnor, who brought them back in 1242 and settled them on his lands at Aylesford in Kent. Sir William de Vescy also gave them a home in Hulne in Northumberland about the same time, or earlier. In the lists of Provinces, England ranked third, after the Holy Land and Sicily.

Carmel in England experienced an early and rapid growth and exercised considerable influence in the Order's evolution in Europe. The English Province opened several houses in Ireland and Scotland. The Irish communities formed a separate Province in 1305 while the Scottish communities had to wait until 1324 to become an independent Province. The Scottish Province closed its last remaining house in 1559 during the Reformation. With studia in Oxford, Cambridge, and London, the English Province produced a goodly number of learned men and took a notable part in the controversy with Lollardy, Thomas Netter of Walden especially distinguishing himself. In the persons of such men as Richard Misyn, Thomas Fishlawe, and Robert Southfield the Carmelites shared in the medieval mystical movement.

It was not until the 20th century that the Irish Carmelites definitively brought the Order back to England after its suppression in 1538 by Henry VIII, settling first in Kent, later in Wales, eventually in other parts of England. The turning point in the revival of Carmel in England was the recovery of the convent in Aylesford which has since become a noted spiritual centre and Marian shrine. A commissariat was erected in 1952, and a Province in 1969, with the title of "The Province of the Assumption". The Anglo-Welsh Province opened two communities in Scotland. The Province officially changed its name in 1999 to the Province of Great Britain.
At present the Province has about 40 religious working in England and Italy.

 
For further information: Province of Great Britain
Provincial Office

Whitefriars
Tanners Street
FAVERSHAM
Kent ME13 7JW
Tel. 01795-532449
Fax 01795-539511

On June 13, 1973, the Provincial Chapter of the Upper German Province decided to start a foundation of the Carmelite Order in India. The Prior Provincial, Fr. Joseph Kotschner, travelled to India looking for opportunities to establish the Order in the subcontinent. As a result of the discussions with many bishops the first group of students arrived in Bamberg, Germany, at the end of 1973. Two more groups followed in 1974 and 1976.

On May 21, 1982, the first house of the Order in India, Carmel Nivas, was erected canonically at Karukadam, Diocese of Kothamangalam. Carmel Nivas serves as the minor seminary and was the first centre of the Provincial Commissariat erected in 1993. The novitiate house, named as Karmel Nikethan, Kartikulam, was erected canonically in 1983. In 1988 the house for students of theology in Bangalore was inaugurated and named Carmel Jyothi. The Order made rapid progress in India and another formation house for students for Philosophy, Carmel Sadan, was canonically erected in Thrissur in 1994. Since 1997 the house serves also as the house of the deu Commissary Provincial. In 1998 another formation house, Carmel Bhavan, was opened in Karukutty. Beside of the formation work the Carmelites are active not only in parish ministry, but in preaching retreats, socio-spiritual activities and in the school of the mission in Andra Pradesh. In 2000 the first Indian Carmelites went to Kenya to start a new mission there. The first house was officially blessed in June 2005.

In 2002 the Assembly of the Commissariat decided to initiate a process of discussion with the Upper German Province regarding the feasibility of the Indian Commissariat becoming an independent Province. The Province of Upper Germany formally applied for the erection of a Province in India in April 2007. Eventually the Province of St. Thomas came into existence on July 16, 2007, with Fr. Sojan Matthew Neendoor  as the first Prior Provincial of the Province together with the Provincial Councillors Frs. Martin Pulickal, Dominic Vadakekuttiankal, Sunny Jacob Thuruthippilly and Bosco Njaliath.

At present the Province of St. Thomas of the Syro-Malabar Rite has five canonically erected houses and about 85 religious working in India, Canada, Kenya, Great Britain, United States, Ireland, Trinidad and Tobago, Zimbabwe and Italy.

For further information: Province of India

Carmelsadan
Chettupuzha 680 621
THRISSUR (Kerala)
Tel. 0487-360678 / 362234
Fax 0487-362234

Carmelites visited Indonesia in the 17th century, when Blessed Dionysius of the Nativity and Redemptus of the Cross suffered martyrdom on Sumatra.

Having successfully contributed to the restoration of the Rio de Janeiro Province (Brazil), the Carmelites in the Netherlands turned their thoughts to undertaking the work of evangelisation in the Dutch East Indies. This decision was in no small part due to the mission-minded Bl. Titus Brandsma, at the time a member of the Provincial Council. In 1923 three Carmelites, including the superior, Fr. Clement van der Pas, arrived to take over from the Jesuits the island of Madura and the Eastern part of Java with headquarters in Malang. At the time less than 200 native Javanese were Catholic.

As more missionaries joined the work, the Carmelites opened new parishes and imported teaching Orders for schools. By 1927 the mission had become an apostolic prefecture with Van der Pas at its head. In 1937 the first Javanese Carmelite, Gerard Singgih Padmowyoto, was ordained. In 1939 Malang became an apostolic vicariate, and its vicar, Avertanus Albers, received episcopal consecration.

During the Japanese occupation in World War II, the Carmelites were interned and several suffered mistreatment and death. But the local seminary survived and after Indonesia became independent, the pace of growth accelerated. In 1960 Indonesia was made a commissariat general with Martin Sarka Dipojudo as commissary. In 1967 Andrew Harjaka was named head of the new province. When Franciscus Xaverius Hadisumarta succeeded Albers as bishop of Malang, the Carmelite apostolate in Indonesia may be said to have reached its maturity.

At present the Province of Indonesia has about 290 religious working in Indonesia, Australia, Great Britain, Germany and Italy.

For further information: Province of Indonesia

Provinsialat Ordo Karmel
Jl. Talang 3
MALANG 65112
Tel. 0341-574929 / 30
Fax 341-566376
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The houses of the Order in Ireland, the first of which was founded in Leighlinbridge, Co. Kildare in 1271, were once part of the English Province. But because of dissension, this association seemed to last only till 1300 and the autonomous Irish Province was erected in 1305. The Protestant Reformation brought much damage to the Province: in 1570 there were only four or five houses left in the Province and the Prior General, Fr. Rubeus, ordered the surviving confreres to return to these houses under the authority of a Vicar Provincial. Since there was little hope of restoring the Province within a short period of time, the General Chapter of 1593 appointed a "titular Provincial", simply to at least preserve the title. Nevertheless, although severely diminished, the Province never totally disappeared, thanks also to the help it received from Carmelites from the Continent. In 1737 the Province was once again canonically erected.

In the second half of the 19th century the Irish Carmelites founded houses in Australia, from which there emerged a General Commissariat in 1930 and a new Province of the Order in 1948. Similarly the Province of St. Elias in North America was born from the foundations made from Ireland since 1889. Also the restoration of the British Province in 1969 was due to the Irish brothers who started working there in 1926. Today the Irish mission in Zimbabwe, founded in 1946, is really flourishing.

At present the Province of Ireland has about 125 religious working in Ireland, Zimbabwe, Italy and Kenya.

 
For further information: Province of Ireland
Provincial Office:

Carmelite Priory
9, Third Street
P.O. Box 259
MUTARE
Tel. 20-63413