Ain’t Nuthin’ but a Hound Dog

Today in the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite is the feast of Saint Dominic de Guzmán (1170 – 06 August 1221), founder of the Order of Preachers, known as the Dominicans.

In the Extraordinary Form calendar that my current breviary follows, this feast was last Sunday, the 4th (or would have been, had it not been a Sunday).

You might wonder why neither date is the actual date of the saint’s death, as is the custom. Well, the sixth is the Feast of the Transfiguration, so Dominic gets bumped. Apparently when they reformed the calendar, somebody thought it was better to be bumped back than bumped forward.

Whatever.

Dominic was from a distinguished Spanish noble family, and I can only imagine what they thought of his plan to become a mendicant preacher. But preach he did: he made it his mission to preach against the errors of the Albigensians, a heretical sect in the south of what is today France.

This original inquisition had as its chief weapons persuasive preaching and the Rosary.

There’s an old joke:

Two men considering a religious vocation were having a conversation. “What is similar about the Jesuit and Dominican Orders?” the one asked.

The second replied, “Well, they were both founded by Spaniards – Saint Dominic for the Dominicans, and Saint Ignatius of Loyola for the Jesuits. They were also both founded to combat heresy – the Dominicans to fight the Albigensians, and the Jesuits to fight the Protestants.”

“What is different about the Jesuit and Dominican Orders?”

“Met any Albigensians lately?”

Pope Benedict XVI had this to say about Saint Dominic:

This great Saint reminds us that in the heart of the Church a missionary fire must always burn. It must be a constant incentive to make the first proclamation of the Gospel and, wherever necessary, a new evangelization. Christ, in fact, is the most precious good that the men and women of every time and every place have the right to know and love!

There’s another old joke that the name “Dominicans” is actually a Latin pun Domini canes, or Hounds of the Lord.

Tradition has it that Dominic’s mother, while pregnant with him, had a vision of a black and white dog with a torch in its mouth; wherever the dog went, it set fire to the earth.

This vision was fulfilled when Dominic and his followers went forth, clad in black and white, setting fire to the earth with the Gospel.

Let us pray that, in the tradition of Saint Dominic and his early followers, as a hound is loyal to his master so too we will remain loyal to the Gospel. Let us all be faithful sheep dogs for the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ.

May Saint Dominic come to the help of your Church
by his merits and teaching, O Lord,
and may he, who was an outstanding preacher of your truth,
be a devoted intercessor on our behalf.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.

Amen.