The Carmelites are eight hundred years in existence and Carmel is the first Order in the Church to be dedicated to Mary the Mother of God. The Order was founded by a group of hermits on Mount Carmel in the Holy Land at the end of the twelfth century, during the time of the Crusades. Mount Carmel was sacred to the memory of Elijah the prophet, who was the model of hermits and monks. These hermits grouped themselves around an oratory dedicated to Mary and they were soon known as the Brothers of Saint Mary of Mount Carmel. They received a formula of life from Albert the Patriarch of Jerusalem around the year 1209.

The Carmelites were soon forced to migrate to Europe where they joined the mendicant movement and became one of the four great orders of friars after 1247. They survived and thrived, spreading all over Europe in the towns and universities. The Carmelite nuns and the Secular Order were founded in 1452 by Blessed John Soreth, the General of the Order at that time. During the late Middle Ages the Church, including the religious orders, was in decline and the Carmelites too suffered from plague, lack of numbers and the general malaise of the age.

All this was to change with the Catholic Reformation and the Council of Trent. God raised up two great reformers for the Order in St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross. St. Teresa began the reform of Carmel by opening a new convent, St. Joseph's, in Avila in 1562 and in 1568 St. John of the Cross began the reform of the friars. Their aim was to search for greater intimacy with God through prayer and a burning zeal for the unity of the Church recently divided by the Reformation.