New nuns in North Dakota

At the invitation of Bismarck Bishop David Kagan, two groups of religious sisters have established their first communities in North Dakota.

Four cloistered Carmelite sisters from Alexandria, S.D. began living in a new monastery northeast of Hague, N.D. in Emmons County on March 19. The Carmelite nuns wear a full brown habit for their clothing, complete with a scapular (a long, narrow outer cloak with a hole for the head) and veil. As cloistered nuns, they live a life of enclosure—not leaving their monastery except for rare occasions—that allows the sisters to live in complete silence and prayer.

In addition, four religious sisters from the Congregation of Teresian Carmelites are now serving the people of the Bismarck Diocese’s Catholic Indian Mission on the Standing Rock Indian reservation in south-central N.D.—8,500 miles from their home in Kerala, India. It is the order’s first foundation in the western hemisphere. The sisters will work as missionaries, assisting the priests and parishes in Sioux County and teaching at the St. Bernard Mission School in Fort Yates.

For more information and photos of the cloistered Carmelite sisters’ establishment near Hague, visit this link: http://bit.ly/1hYIEL4. In addition, the public is invited to three days of open house April 23-25 to meet the sisters before they begin their enclosure.

For more information and photos of the Teresian Carmelite sisters’ establishment in Fort Yates, visit this link: http://bit.ly/1gYy9F5.