Our Lady of Fatima OCDS Community
Bunnell, FL
St Joseph’s Carmelite Monastery in Bunnell, Florida, has been the home of Our Lady of Fatima's OCDS Community since 1991. It was initially under the Warsaw Province of Poland. Fr Joseph Zawada, OCD, Daniel, and Virginia Smigielski founded the group. The Community was Canonically Established on October 20, 1998. In 2006, the OCDS Garden of God Community from Daytona Beach, Florida, merged with the Bunnell Community. In 2017, it changed to the jurisdiction of the Washington Province, United States, with Fr Artur Chojda, OCD, as the Superior of the monastery.
The Community is thriving at St Joseph’s Monastery. Growing in Carmelite spirituality is facilitated here by the ministry of the priests Fr. Krzysztof Jank, OCD, and Fr. Robert John, OCD. The group meets every First Saturday of the month. The friars offer Confession, Mass, Adoration, and the Holy Rosary. In the pavilion, after the morning devotions, the group has fellowship, a business meeting, and general formation for the entire Community. Returning to the chapel, they pray morning prayer using the Liturgy of the Hours book and have silent meditation. Afterward, the individual formation classes will break out to several locations on the grounds to meet for an hour.
There are five Aspirants, eight members preparing to make their Temporary Promise, seven Definitively Professed, and nine Extended Members. Guests interested in joining participate in the meetings, except for formation classes, until the new formation cycle begins. It is a prayerful, joyful Community striving to live out the Rule of St. Albert in various secular settings. Having St Joseph Monastery as its spiritual home has given the group stability and opportunity for growth.
Theresian Studies
Prayer for Priests
O Jesus, eternal Priest, keep your priests within the shelter of Your Sacred Heart, where none may touch them.
Keep unstained their anointed hands,
which daily touch Your Sacred Body.
Keep unsullied their lips, daily purpled with your Precious Blood. Keep pure and unearthly their hearts, sealed with the sublime mark of the priesthood.
Let Your holy love surround them and
shield them from the world’s contagion.
Bless their labors with abundant fruit and may the souls to whom they minister be their joy and consolation here and in heaven their beautiful and everlasting crown. Amen.