The call to Carmelite contemplative life is also a call to a particular community. Our vocation team will companion you on your journey as we discern together if God is calling you to our community.
Upcoming Discernment Retreats
We invite you to consider joining us for one of our Discernment Retreat Weekends.
Is Baltimore Carmel Right for Me?
Are you a single Catholic woman who is age 40 or younger?
If so, we can help you discern if God is calling you to our community.
Do you seek:
- A passionate, unconditional commitment to God for God’s people through a life of contemplation?
- A vibrant multi-generational, multi-national community that shares life and prays together?
- Significant times of silence and solitude?
- A prophetic lifestyle expressing values of simplicity, peace, justice and mutuality, and concern for our planet’s environmental needs?
- Extensive study of Carmelite texts, saints, and spirituality?
- On-going education in theology, spirituality, scripture, and contemporary world issues?
- Meaningful work with your hands, your intellect, and your heart?
- Solidarity with the poor, oppressed, and marginalized?
- To lead others to prayer?
- To offer the hospitality of listening to the needs of God’s people; holding them in prayer, and responding to those who call, write, or come to our monastery?
- The traditional values of Carmel in contemporary expression?
- To share our Carmelite Spirituality and Liturgical Life with a broader community?
If these words resonate with your heart’s desire, our community may be right for you.
Signs of a Carmelite Vocation
A Belief in the Power of Prayer
Saint Teresa of Avila understood prayer as an apostolic work for the sake of the Church and God’s people. We believe that prayer can open our world to the transformation God seeks to work in souls.
If you desire to serve God’s people through a life of prayer, you may have a Carmelite vocation.
Drawn to Significant Periods of Silence and Solitude
Intimacy with God is nurtured in times of silence and solitude.
If you regularly seek times to be alone with God, you may have a Carmelite vocation.
Desire to Live in the Same Community for Life
We live out our lives in the simplicity of our monastery, in companionship with the other nuns whom God has called here. Our commitment to God and to our sisters is radically unconditional, articulated by our vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.
If you find this kind of commitment attractive and challenging, you may have a Carmelite vocation.
Attracted to Carmelite Spirituality
Carmelites have a rich spirituality articulated in the writings of great women and men who teach us about the life of prayer and the path to union with God. Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, Thérèse of Lisieux, Edith Stein, Elizabeth of the Trinity, Teresa de los Andes, and other Carmelites served God’s people by being united with Christ in the depth of their soul, contemplatively present to those in need.
If these holy women and men inspire you to seek to serve God and to love God’s people as they did, you may have a Carmelite vocation.
Getting to Know Each Other
It is helpful to remember that discerning a vocation is a process. Since everyone is unique, we adapt the process according to your needs and circumstances. We encourage you to visit frequently, which will give us the opportunity to get to know one another gradually. During your visits, you will have the opportunity to learn more about our life and to share your desire for a life of prayer with us.
If our mutual discernment suggests that God is calling you to our community, you will have the opportunity to visit for longer periods of time. Longer visits will allow you to enter more
fully into our rhythm of silence and solitude, community, work and prayer.
The next step would be a live-in experience where you live with us for an extended period of time. This is a time for deeper discernment as you and the community decide if God is calling you to enter our monastery.
Another step before entrance is to complete a psychological evaluation, a common requirement for entrance to religious communities.
We look forward to meeting you!
Contact a Member of our Vocation Team
Whether you’re simply curious about our life or ready to begin the discernment process, Sr. Judy Long looks forward to hearing from you.
Sr. Judy Long
410-823-7415, ext. 356
