Madame Barbe Acarie (1566-1618) Founder of The French Discalced Carmelites
The Work of Bringing the Discalced Carmelites of Spain to France
Madame Acarie was quite aware of the necessity of restoring the monastic religious orders in France in the aftermath of the Protestant Reformation. There was a need for reform and return to the primitive rules. Thus, the following Orders saw sweeping activity such as:
the Benedictine Order
the Third Order of St. Francis [Brothers of Picpus]
the Feuillants
the Récollets
the Carmelites
the Trinitarians
the Augustinians
the Premonstratensians
Madame Barbe Acarie was most actively involved in all efforts of regeneration and monastic renaissance. She argued and counseled, enlightening everything by the light of her reason and faith. Everyone resorted to her as a source of life. The superiors and abbesses consulted her for the reform and conduct of their houses. So in addition to her secular life, she became the directress and spiritual mother of numerous orders.
Soon her reputation for wisdom and holiness spread far and wide. She traveled to convents which implored the charity of her counsels. In regards to the Carmelites the Abbot Q. de Brétigny of Spanish origin, but living in France, was the original person who thought of bringing several mother superiors trained by St. Teresa of Avila to France. The Abbot felt this way would prevent heresy and would return the Order to its original primitive cloistered life of prayer and penance.
Mr. Georges de Cadoudal believes that based on his research of Madame Acarie’s own words that the task was divinely decided by Heaven as to who best would lead this effort. It has reserved for Madame Acarie the responsibility and the honor of triumphing over all previous and future obstacles. Additionally, this holy woman resolved to meet with St. Teresa of Avila herself. However, little did she know of St. Teresa’s death in 1582. In spite of the death of St. Teresa, it was imperiously and repeatedly commanded of Madame Acarie to accomplish the project.
Thus, many years later a conference took place on July 27, 1599 at the Convent of the Carthusians. All the learned and pious people of France that were involved came together. There was much controversy and opinion of a negative nature until Madame Acarie spoke. Following this the Abbot Dom Beaucousin spoke urging the participants to listen to the words of his humble servant, Madame Acarie.
Next, Madame Acarie received from the Princess de Longueville her assistance by her support stating,
“I will be the founder, I will spare neither penalties nor expenses, I will take charge of obtaining the King’s approval, and the necessary letters patent.”
This noble and pious princess set to work at once. She effortlessly obtained the royal authorization.
“The name for the first monastery was Rue Saint-Jacques. This would be a place where so many noble souls found shelter against human seductions, where so many others came to hide under the veils of Carmel, as they bled from the wounds given by the world. These sacred vaults have memories of the most brilliant beauties, of the greatest names of an incomparable century.” wrote Mr. Cadoudal.
Much detail is given in his book of the great number of postulants desiring entrance to the new Carmel houses from the finest families of France.
He discusses the trials and troubles of bringing two Spanish mother superiors to France to train new mother superiors and novices in the original and ancient practices of the Carmelite Order. The Spanish Carmelite nuns arrived in Paris on October 15th, 1604. As the years passed away Madame Barbe Avrillot Acarie established 55 convents and monasteries of the new Discalced Carmelite Order in France.
On September 15, 1605 her daughter Marguerite, who was to become one of the glories of Carmel in France under the name Mother Margaret of the Blessed Sacrament, took the veil at the Convent of the Rue Saint-Jacques. She was 15 years old. In 1607 her sister Genevieve entered the convent. Lastly, Marie, her eldest daughter, took the veil in 1608.
After rendering the last duties to the excellent man whose name she had borne and honored, the holy woman who had provided for the settlement of her sons, and had arranged the affairs of her house so as to not to leave them any embarrassment, followed the voice which had long attracted her to Carmel.
Pierre Acarie, her husband and ardent supporter of her work, died in October, 1613 after a sudden illness. Shortly before this, her father Nicholas Avrillot died suddenly as well at her estate in Bercy.
However, the holy woman who had accomplished her earthly work, was feeling that all the bonds which bound her to the world were breaking one by one. Some supernatural forebodings and mysterious visions had already told her that the hour was near when she would be rid of all human hindrance, when she would finally leave the shore and sail to the infinite.
During a pilgrimage to the church of St. Nicholas [near Nancy] in the Lorraine Region, Madame Acarie heard the mystical voice of St. Teresa of Avila tell her that she would enter Carmel as that is what she desired and was attracted to – not as a mother and professed nun but as a simple lay sister who would be devoted to the most painful and repulsive works of the monastery. When the time for her full consecration to God came, she asked to be placed in the poorest house of the Order. Even though this was frowned upon from the superiors of the French Order, Sister Marie of the Incarnation was placed in the convent in Amiens. She arrived there at the beginning of Lent 1614. Madame Acarie died in the Carmelite Convent of Pontoise on April 18, 1618.
References:
The First English Translation of A Biography of Madame Acarie, 1566-1618, by Teresa Farris-Dacar, Ingram Publishing, 2020, originally written by Georges de Cadoudal in 1863 in French.
About the Author:
Mrs. Teresa Farris-Dacar has an M.A. in History, M.Ed. Clinical Counseling, M.Ed. Curriculum Design, B.A. Humanities, a major in Journalism, and has published the books listed below. They are available from the author by e-mailing her at ForGodandKing@att.net or placing a special order at Barnes & Noble or Books A Million. All books published by Ingram Publishing Company.
From England – To Barbados – To Carolina;1670-1700: The Founding of Charles Towne;
For God and King [a Christian historical novel];
Heaven Bound by Wearing The Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel;
3 books translated from French into English for the first time:
- The Life of Mother Anne-Seraphine Boulier (written in 1683),
- Records of the Monastery of Dijon,1611-1789,
- Biography of Madame Acarie, 1566-1618.