1226
Ordo Fratrum Beatissimæ Virginis Mariæ de Monte Carmelo / The Order of the Friars of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel

The Carmelite brotherhood that was born in the Holy Land as a gathering of hermits, was fundamentally changed upon moving to Europe in the 13th century: it began to focus on communal life, settled in cities, engaged in pastoral care and studies and was labelled as a mendicant brotherhood in the 13th century.

Having reached Lithuania in the early 16th century, the Carmelite brethren were the third mendicant order to settle in Vilnius soon after the Dominicans. They built their residence outside the walls of the city of Vilnius, in the suburb of Puszkarnia, on the private estate of the Radziwiłł family. At the end of the period of the Reformation, which was not favourable to religious orders, the Carmelites in Lithuania, as in all of Catholic Europe, experienced a revival. In 1624, the second Carmelite monastery together with the Church of All Saints was founded in Vilnius. In 1687, the Carmelite monasteries in the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania were divided between two provinces: those of Poland Minor–Lithuania and Rus’. All Carmelite monasteries that were in the present territory of Lithuania were assigned to the Province of Poland Minor–Lithuania, and only St George’s Convent in Vilnius became part of the Province of Rus’. The symbolic border of the provinces ran through Vilnius – the two Carmelite communities that operated there subsequently became central monasteries of different provinces (Lithuanian and Lithuanian-Russian). In their heyday (the mid-18th century), both monasteries had novitiates and organised studies for their future priests. The nineteenth century in Lithuania was fatal and tragic for this order. By the end of the century, not a single community had survived. In 1798, the monastery at St George’s Church was the first to be closed after the partitions of the state; its buildings were transferred to the seminary of the Vilnius Diocese. After the uprising of 1863, the Monastery of All Saints became a shelter for the members of various religious orders that had been closed down. In 1867, it was home to 17 Carmelites, 8 Trinitarians, 2 Dominicans and 2 Bernardines. The monastery was abolished in 1886. The Carmelite Order ceased to function in Lithuania. The fate of both of its churches in the Soviet period was similar: St George’s Church became a book storage facility, and the Church of All Saints was initially converted into a storage place, and later housed the permanent exhibition of the Folk Art Department of the Art Museum of Soviet Lithuania.