Carmel of Mary Celebrates Fifty Years

by the Prioress of the Community

The new mural in the cloister chapel

The Carmelite Sisters at the Carmel of Mary, Wahpeton, North Dakota, marked the golden jubilee of their foundation, November 1, 1954. A solemn Mass of Thanksgiving was offered on October 1, 2004, feast of Saint Therese of Lisieux, to celebrate the 50 years of graces. Bishop Samuel J. Aquila, Bishop of Fargo, presided at the Mass, with Bishop James S. Sullivan, Bishop Emeritus, along with 14 priests of the diocese concelebrating.

In his homily Bishop Aquila spoke of God’s love for us and our total response of love as being the core of life in Carmel—of everyone’s life.

The Carmelite Fathers of the Pure Heart of Mary Province, through the kindness of Very Reverend John Russell, provided the luncheon for the Community and the friends of Carmel who attended the celebration. Bishop Aquila then toured the monastery and visited with the Sisters.

How did it happen that the Community at Allentown, Pennsylvania selected Wahpeton, North Dakota, as the site of their first Foundation? A friend of the Allentown Community, Mr. Patrick Flood, a professor at Seton Hall University in New Jersey knew that the Sisters wanted to open a new foundation, as they had become quite a large community. Mr. Flood happened to come across an appeal for the Indian Missions in North Dakota and wrote to Bishop Leo F. Dworschak asking if he wanted a cloistered Carmel in his diocese.

	Bishop Samuel Aquila with the community

This inspiration “out of the blue” was an answer to a prayer and a desire of Aloysius Cardinal Muench, ordinary of the diocese, and his auxiliary, Bishop Dworschak, who had been wondering what special tribute to Our Blessed Mother they could erect for the Marian Year of 1954.

Negotiations began immediately with Mother Clement Mary and the Allentown Carmel and a place was located in Wahpeton where the Franciscan Sisters agreed to sell their “old St. Mary’s hospital.” Permissions were obtained while the bishops were attending the canonization of Pope Pius X, and hopes and desires turned into full swing planning.

Eight sisters left the Carmel of the Little Flower on the Feast of Christ the King led by Mother Mary Rose and Mother Augustine Marie. After an overnight stay in Fargo, they had the joy of celebrating the first Mass, offered by Bishop Dworschak on November 1, 1954, in their new Carmel home. Brother Stanislaus Reybitz, O.Carm., came and with the help of friends they transformed the turn-of-the-century hospital building into a temporary monastery. A mere three years after establishing the new Community, Mother Mary Rose, after a lengthy illness, was called Home to the Lord, leaving Mother Augustine Marie to carry on the work of forming the new Community.

Candidates began to arrive and by 1962 the old brick building was “bulging at the seams.” The Community began planning for a new monastery and 16 acres of land six-ish miles northwest of Wahpeton were donated to the sisters. The new monastery was ready for occupancy in October, 1964. Candidates continued to arrive all through the years and by the mid-eighties the Community numbered 22 Sisters. A phone call from Father Fabian Rosetti, at the suggestion of Father Aloysius Sieracki, O.Carm., who had visited our community, started the ball rolling toward opening a new foundation in San Angelo, Texas, which materialized in the Marian Year of 1988. All plans and permissions were obtained that year though the actual transfer took place January 25, 1989.

Within six years, five new candidates arrived to fill up the empty places in Wahpeton. In January of 2000, the last of the sisters originally from Allentown Carmel was called to her eternal home and we again need to “fill the empty places.” A young woman from Baltimore entered the community on November 1st, thus continuing the mystery of God’s love, who chooses whom he will to scale the heights of Carmel.

A special commemorative jubilee project the Sisters are doing is a large mural of Carmelite saints surrounding a statue of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. The statue was blessed by Bishop Aquila at the end of the jubilee Mass. Two sisters, who majored in art in college, are painting it as time permits. The scene will be erected in the back of the monastery public chapel.

For an online visit to Carmel of Mary, visit: http://dane.weber.org/ carmelofmary