Saint Dominic

Today is the feast of Saint Dominic de Guzmán. He was born near Santo Domingo de Silos in Spain, just north of the Camino, in 1170. Legend has it that before his birth, his barren mother made a pilgrimage to Silos, and dreamt that a dog leapt from her womb carrying a flaming torch in its mouth – and it “seemed to set the whole earth on fire.”

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. 

When Dominic founded the Order of Preachers in 1215, they were quickly nicknamed Dominicans, after their founder. And of course, Domini canis is a Latin play on words meaning “dogs of the Lord.”

And what do the Dominicans do? As their proper name indicates, they preach. Historically, they wandered in pairs like the early Christian disciples, preaching in the villages to any who would hear them.

The early Dominicans were particularly effective against the Albigensian heretics in southern France, which they fought with preaching and the rosary. Legend has it that Dominic received the prayer of the rosary in a vision from the Blessed Virgin Mary. The magnificent stained glass window of our parish church of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary depicts this moment.

So, 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!

Since their founding, the Dominicans preached in various ways suited to the age in which they found themselves. Saint Thomas Aquinas, perhaps the greatest logician and philosopher of the Christian Age, was a Dominican friar.

And, as I’ve mentioned before, their rites of the sacred liturgy are singular and transformative.

Not a bad legacy at all!

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.