Episode 105: St. Dominic - Anniversary

[Music] welcome to godsplaining contemplative preachers contemporary age each week join the dominican friars as they consider all things catholic welcome back to godsplaining i'm father gregory pine joined here by father jacob bertrand janzik and we're delighted to bring in this new month of august whether you're listening immediately upon release or down the line for us it is august both the day that we record and the day that it is dropped so while we would love to bring you more live content which reminds me we have a lives planning coming up tomorrow if you're listening to this on august 5th tomorrow uh at 4 p.m eastern standard time father jacob butcher and i will bring you our i think at this point it's our fourth installment of lives planning but now i'm getting into closing comments without having actually given opening comments which is a sin of sorts um so father jacob bertrand you are winding up your time at summer projects in colorado springs how things been for these uh these last couple weeks good um yeah it's kind of been i don't know kind of all over the place not all over the place that's not that's not right but there's been a lot going on so um wrapping up for i've just finished time in colorado uh but within the last like uh what couple weeks of my time we had our retreat the godsplaining retreat back in new york so i flew back from colorado to new york and kind of bookended that trip in dc as you father gregory know but uh or maybe our listeners don't so um and then came back to colorado for last week out here with focus summer projects and yeah now i'm through with that which is kind of strange because i've been out in colorado since like the end-ish middle-ish of may so it's been a long haul but good but kind you know sad to leave but also looking forward to the fall and things that are coming up and and those sorts of things yeah for sure things to look forward to i guess i want to look back or what would be the opposite of look for yeah i guess look back uh look back to the the god splitting retreat because that was a really sweet moment it was a really excellent thing for the five of us for katie who helped tremendously with it and then for the 70 retreatants were able to join us in huntington new york on long island and for those of you who weren't there maybe just to kind of thought a kind of uh fruit of the weekend was that um yeah we just had some really wonderful exchanges really really wonderful conversations with those who were in attendance and at least for me it really solidified the fact that god's blending isn't just about sound bites that one passively consumes it's really about forming relationships foremost relationship with the lord but also those relationships which conduct us to the lord and i really had um a meaningful sense of that during the time that we shared so i was super grateful for that but you know we talked a little bit about it in the car and i think you might echo some of the thoughts although you were doing more logistics than i was i was just kind of flailing about in conversation while you made sure that the retreat actually happened so kudos to you for that but i don't know any uh any thoughts any impressions from the uh from the weekend yeah i the whole i i guess i don't know how you categorize these things as successes or not because you can always improve they could always be different but i think generally um at least on the friar's end we were i think we were more excited to just be together and be able to to preach the gospel together um but also do it in person so um as we said on the retreat and as father gregory just alluded to a bit that you know for us the our work of preaching the gospel and sharing the faith is not confined to a podcast so it's a great avenue by which to preach uh especially because of people listen to podcasts but for there's a lot more to be said i think for having that time together and to do that as a group to pray together to think about our lord together and just kind of like hang out together so we were able to do all of that and and the seminary where we had the seminary of the immaculate conception in um on long island was really beautiful it was a really great setting for it all so it was just fun to do it and fun to be together and that sort of thing i think too it was the first time since we've started the podcast which is about two years now that the five of us have been together as the five of us so it was it was nice to have that time uh together and and and to have the sort of yeah just be together and preach the gospel together and be with other people who are excited to be there yeah and here we are uh two years into the project we released our first episode on the feast of st dominic in 2019 and here we are coming up again on the feast of saint dominic in 2021 so we thought that at this juncture having whatever i mean 105 episodes normal episodes uh behind us that we would look back on not not the inspiration for the podcasts in a kind of local sense but on the inspiration for the order of preachers from which the podcast arises in a more global way so as we approach the feast of saint dominic to think a little bit about uh the character of his sanctity of his virtue as an inspiration not just for you know for you for me for the five of us who contribute to the podcast but in a wider a wider sense to for the dominican communion and the christian community at large because if he's a saint that means that the church is proposing his virtue to us as a kind of standard of excellence or as a kind of inspiration for how we two might grow in a relationship with the lord so we're here then to talk a little bit about about st dominic so father jacob burch you wanted to set us up with the rough biographical outlines and then maybe we could get into some some of our favorite stories about st dominic yeah so to to clue you into who he was when he was um this will be like a two minute or a couple minute thing if you really want the sort of uh all the pieces of dominic's biography there's a book that we have to read in the novitiate uh by i think was saint dominic and his times is that the right by by vacare it's this massive tome like that i remember the first in the first chapter uh vicar was the author talks about um the like the the soil content in in dominic's hometown so it gets that detailed but this this will be less than that but um yeah so just to to recap on st dominick he was born in either 1170 or 1171 in spain in cali royga spain um he was born into a pretty well to do family uh had at least one other brother manes was his brother's name and then obviously his parents blessed jane is his mother she's a blessed and his brother manas is also a blessed so he grew up in a pretty comfortable i guess by all i don't know what 12th century comfortability looks like but you know they had money so he grew up there and then as a young as a young man was sent to do his studies with his uncle who was a priest um so he studied with his with his uncle as a young as a young man which was would have been a sort of typical thing to go study under a priest as priests tended to have some sort of education to instill and as he grew older he ended up entering a cannon re in osma spain so he he was a religious before he founded the order so he he was augustinian canon in the cathedral city of osma under the bishop who was a diego for most of dominic's life as a canon there and through his time in the canon or sorry in the cathedral canon re he sort of rose through the ranks and uh became the subprior of the community and was noted for his sort of seriousness and his intellectual kind of study and his prayerfulness but you know as a as a well-respected young canon a young priest and as a as subprior as a young respected canon the bishop diego took dominic on a on a sort of apostolic trip to what we think was to help not arrange but sort of like tie up the ends of a marriage between some nobles and on that trip um across the south of spain and um south of spain over through france and italy and the south of france dominic and diego encountered this heresy um this is where the order was founded or at least the first sort of heretical movement that dominic preached against the albigensians and in the in encountering these albigensians they they were duelists who believed in a the good spiritual world and the evil material world so despised the body and things of matter and um had issues with incarnational doctrine and these sort of things and dominic and diego wanted to stay to preach against this this heresy to bring these people back into the fold ultimately diego was not allowed to stay bishop diego was sent back to his diocese but dominic was allowed and it was in this south of france region that dominic founded after a good number of years working and preaching the area founded the order the order was officially founded in 1216 as a group of men dedicated to study and prayer and the preaching of the gospel so december 22 12 16 the order is the is the anniversary of the order's founding and then dominic would die not too long after he died in 1221 so in august of 12 21 so just under um five years after the order's official founding so this month august we're celebrating the 800th anniversary of saint dominic's death he died in august of 12 21 so that's super quick but i think we're going to talk a little bit more about some things in dominic's life but give you at least the the skeleton of of that for you and then within that skeleton we want to kind of add the flesh or fill out the features of saint tom excuse me st dominic's holiness or sanctity and i think one one good way to by by which to do that is to focus on his virtues and you know you could say many things about saint dominic he was charitable he was merciful he was solicitous or kind you know very concerned for the good of those with whom he was in contact he had a spirit of mortification he was humble he was magnanimous you could see all kinds of things but maybe we could just pick out a couple of virtues and highlight those with a couple of stories so how about first uh so so to highlight saint dominic's charity or his mercy you describe this journey that he took to help tie up the ends of a marriage and during the course of that journey he stayed overnight in an inn with his bishop and his traveling companions and at the end he encountered an albigensian heretic and saint dominic is it said spent the whole night engaged in conversation with this gentleman until such time as with the with the dawning of the sun the man was reconciled to the true faith so you see there a commitment to the lord and a commitment to the discourse but also in a very human way a commitment to the love of this man not simply because saint dominic wanted to add a successful convert to his ledger but because he was moved he was you know very much animated by the prospect of this man's salvation and said that you know when saint dominic would pray at night he would weep copiously so copiously as to leave little pools of tears on the church steps and he would ask the lord what will become of sinners so it's very evident that he was he was motivated motivated by charity motivated by mercy that being one of the one of the big virtues we see in his life uh what do you think are some some others that you see in saint dominic others that you want to highlight yeah i think uh his his sort of dedication i don't know if there's like a virtue you can that one word kind of summing up the virtue i guess it falls under charity really but his dedication and desire to um to preach the gospel um and his uh yeah the way by which he he saw or understood that preaching the gospel was not just something that you do he wasn't a preacher in in the sense of it was his job to preach but it was something that he was he was a preacher he lived the life of preaching and this is something that this kind of charism perhaps more than a virtue of the orders you know passed on to us the sons of saint dominic who live the life of him i remember or the life that he established i remember on a vocation weekend uh on the vocational weekend that i went to at the house of studies when i was in college i think father gregory we were on the same weekend i can't remember i think that's right um yeah uh father james brent uh was then a deacon and there was a holy hour one evening and he preached at the holy hour and he preached about saint dominic's life as inspiring um future dominicans the generations of dominicans who would come and one of the things that struck me from that little fervorino that little homily was um how father james mentioned how how tirelessly saint dominic uh walked back and forth across europe between rome and france and spain preaching the gospel throughout his life um you know so saint dominic is known to have walked barefoot between the cities and wore boots in the city so but you know there are stories of him of how he prayed when he walked and how he prayed when he preached and as father gregory said how he prayed at night there's a saying that dominic spoke only to god or about god with the brethren with others there are all these stories of saint dominic meeting different people along the way the innkeeper is a great one um you know kind of the example parks allowance of dominic's preaching but just his desire to preach the gospel with all that he with all that he was and all that he is you also see this this sort of um desire to preach in the way by which he sent the early brethren out to preach the gospel two by two imitating the apostolic mission so right after the order was found was founded in august of the next year at the assumption uh of so it would be 1217 saint dominic sent out the the handful of men and pairs um throughout to the university cities of europe so as to preach but the sense of this tirelessness um this willingness this sacrificial ability desire to kind of waste himself for the sake of the gospel to spend himself for the sake of the gospel is something that is um i guess yeah inspiring in a founder someone who would give his life so fully to a mission yeah and and you can see in that witness so to identify two virtues one devotion this promptness with which he gave himself the wholeheartedness with which he gave himself and then magnanimity that he wanted to do it in a way that was great he desired great things worthy of great honors because they were great so he didn't shy away because he thought oh man you know maybe this will be thought proud or maybe this will be thought ambitious or maybe this will be thought vainglorious he just knew that the work had to be done he knew that in the marrow of his bones and you you have that book that you quoted earlier saint dominic in his times by vacare a couple of quotations are given that saint dominic when questioned about the nature of his mission said something to the effect of don't question me i know what i'm doing so st dominic was was confident but confident with the kind of yes sense that this was on the grand scale so like when you talk about august 12 17 when he disperses the brethren to some of these major university cities in europe the quote that we have attributed to them in that in that setting is grain gathered in a silo or gathered in a barn rots so the sense was this grain needs to be distributed it needs to fall to the ground and die so that from that arises the life of the gospel as our lord jesus christ communicates to us in revelation and the tradition etc so there's the sense that he wants it he's hungry for it and he also knows that it's great but in no way is he cowed by fear he's he's just uh he has the the sense of purpose of one uh through whom god is very evidently working and i think that's very beautiful to behold even 800 years after the fact but something that can really orient our own apostolic endeavors so thinking that of those apostolic endeavors let's take a quick break and when we come back we'll see how saint dominic's virtues remain for us sources of inspiration and guides for our own 21st century life so we'll see you on the other side of the break [Music] you are listening to god's planning visit us at godsplaining.org to listen to our episodes shop our store and donate to our podcast all gifts go to improving the podcast and bringing the gospel to more listeners thanks for your support alright folks welcome back to godsplaining we are here talking about saint dominic on the 800th anniversary of his death and on the second anniversary of the launching of the podcast inspired by the charism that he received from the lord to preach the gospel in season and out of season so we just talked a little bit about saint dominic his life and then the virtues which he exhibits in his life and now we want to turn to how those virtues remain fruitful for us so father jacob bertrand you and father patrick just wrote a book which is effectively um saint dominic's way of life proposed to us as a guide for christian living so what was it like maybe you can just kind of lead us into it by talking a little bit about the process of researching for and writing that book and then your mentality when thinking about how saint dominic's life applies to our own yeah so father patrick and i um i think it was father patrick's idea now it was father patrick's idea wasn't mine um but and coming up on this month st dominic's 800th anniversary um so i guess about a year ago he proposed father patrick proposed this idea of um representing saint dominic to the to contemporary christians to the 21st century that sort of thing we you know there are a number of saints that have are quickly recognized and some of their attributes and virtues are quickly recognized in popular piety so saint francis comes to mind immediately but less so about saint dominic in many ways he was kind of a hidden um founder for him it was about establishing a way of life and then he didn't live terribly long after that so he gave us a way of life and is certainly the inspirer of that and the graces of of saint dominic are you know bestowed upon the order but we thought that you know being so devoted and and loving saint dominic so much that he really does have a lot to offer to uh the 21st century so that that was the inspiration behind it so what we what we thought to do was to highlight some um some of saint dominic's characteristics or virtues um using stories um from his life or a lot of a lot of what we know about st dominic comes from the the canonization process after his death when the church was reviewing his life before he was canonized before he was made a saint so from from eyewitnesses of dominic's life talking about him is how we learn a lot about saint dominic so we thought let's look at that let's look at saint dominick's life and let's see how that life has formed us as dominicans but um translate that over for those who aren't living dominican life but can still be inspired by uh the life that saint dominic lived in the virtues that he lived and and um you know his witness to christ so we did that under the book is is composed of eight chapters um and we we each chapter is kind of dedicated to a a part of saint dominic's life or um a virtue of his or that sort of thing so there there is saint dominic was particularly given to scripture he always carried the gospel of matthew with him by way of example so what the first chapter is on on scripture it's called living in the word and we look at well what did saint dominic do how did he live and then how does that help us so even just by way of example of that of of um you know diving into the scriptures of of coming to know christ through the living word and um using that as as a means by which we can deepen our faith and enrich our own spiritual lives of course you know reading the scriptures is not a novel thing but um you know looking at it through the lens of a particular saint of how saint dominic lived with and through the scriptures is is um perhaps a new way or a different way to look at it so there are seven other chapters in addition to that one but that's that's one of them where where we kind of highlighted st dominic's life a bit yeah so maybe maybe we could just think a little bit then about st thomas devotedness to the word of god as proclaimed as revealed uh and the way in which that shaped him or shapes dominican life and more broadly shapes christian life and i think one thing to kind of draw out is saint dominic is a is a contemplative so you describe how when traveling saint dominic was very given to prayer it's often said that he would just break into song often sing the avemar estella or the veni creator spiritus or other such like hymns and that saint dominic was kind of always as it were like you said he spoke with god or about god he was always poised for those types of conversations very recollected in the lord and that the scriptures are are a big part of that and i think that for a lot of 21st century types we want to have certainty that god is speaking to us and so it can be easy to kind of get hung up you know in questions of discernment and trying to tease out as it were what the lord wills in a very concrete and particular way from my life and i think oftentimes we can be forgetful of that of the fact that god has spoken and continues to speak in the sacred page not in the sense that you just open the bible and flip to a random page point at it and then do whatever is said even that's like if it's like and elijah you know sent the she-bear after the children to mull them and you're like holy smokes i hope that doesn't apply to my life in any real way um but in the sense that you know god shapes our minds and hearts after the manner of his revelation so that we can be more receptive to that word and so that we can be more shaped by that word and so ultimately that we can be more conformed by that word so saint dominic in his preaching mission has this very very deep appreciation for the way in which scripture is formative formative in the recitation of the liturgy of the hours formative and the celebration of the sacred liturgy formative and you know lectio divina and more broadly um but that it's something that ought to be held close it's something that ought to be held dear because it gives us the kind of confidence that the lord speaks so yeah i don't know yeah i mean there are things in that chapter that you identify but yeah other thoughts yeah one of the things that we um especially when we were editing so father patrick and i wrote we didn't write the chapters together we wrote we divvied up the work basically and wrote um half the book each and then did heavy editing to make sure that things were you know that it fit together as one book and not kind of like contributions to a project but as as one book so and then our editors did a great job helping with that too but one of the things that we realized in our own kind of editing process process together was that it was difficult sometimes to suss out where different where different i guess stories or parts of dominic's life would fit like for example father gregory mentioned that the story of the innkeeper the story of the innkeeper could fit in a number of the chapters of the book but it was like well where do we put it where does it best sit and i think that that struggle of trying to figure out well where does it does it fit within the chapter on on truth does it fit within the chapter of within the fold of living within the church or mission to witness on preaching or friendship onto heaven of of you know a chapter on friendship and dominic's great love for people like where do we put it and i think that reveals something about saint dominic's life not our indecisiveness perhaps our indecisiveness but uh something more about saint dominic's life and the christian life more generally is that um is that saint dominic's life was um and especially the form of life that he established is one that encompasses the entirety of the human person so if you look at the structure of dominic's life or and what he left in the form of life that we live it's it's it's basically based on a couple things that a life of intense prayer of contemplation a life of study but a life of doing those things together in a in a community after you know the one goal of preaching um and and that and those aspects um draw in the whole of the person and the same way that dominic like preaching for the dominican preaching for the for saint dominic wasn't a job it's a way of life so too like christianity you know christianity being a christian isn't something we just do on the weekends or at you know sunday mass but really is involves all of us because the lord wants all of us he wants to to save and redeem you know us as men and women not as pieces so you see that i think very alive in saint dominic's life uh from his desire to study and know the lord through through whether that's sacred scripture or other sacred texts theological texts whether that's through prayer through his preaching through his friendship with the brethren through his his love of the blessed mother and the blessed mother's love of him you know you just see this over and over that a reminder that um there's there's a wholeness to holiness that the lord wants the whole of us and that the christian life isn't an imposition but on on that but like an invitation to to be given to that uh to be fulfilled in that and i think saint dominic's life uh highlights that in a unique and in a special and i don't know balanced sounds kind of like i don't know psycho babble kind of thing like he lived a balanced life what does that mean does he did he get like enough fruits and vegetables that type thing but you know he lived a balanced life um that that was given to being you know sanctified through and through and offers an example for dominicans but also for you know for for the lady who might have a devotion to him yeah i i i kind of want to tease out the implications of that word bounce because you highlight different aspects of it in the way you describe saint dominic uh but i think that that's something for which a lot of people you know nowadays are are pining or uh desirous thereof because i think a lot of us feel just kind of a little bit off-kilter a little bit wonky we feel that our lives have assumed a shape that we might not have ordinarily wanted or were we to have been posed with the option of living this way or that way we we would not necessarily have chosen to live in the way that we presently do i mean in the sense of like a lot of folks are working remotely and spending 50 hours a week looking at a computer screen and maybe you know they at the beginning of the pandemic they were thinking oh this will afford me the opportunity to do these things that i've been wanting to do but then they found that those things were left undone for the next 18 months and all they had the time and patience to do is just watch the next episode of whatever tv show they were using to get themselves through the sadness of these kind of present trial times so i think that a lot of us here balance and we're like yes you know i want something of that balance and i think one of the things that's that's so attractive about the light of saint dominic is that his balance begins and ends in the lord right so the dominicans are are preaching order right so it's a it's a form of apostolic life there's the sense that saint dominic wanted to live the life that the apostles lived and he knew that you know it's proper to apostle to be with the lord right and then to to preach um as it's described in in mark 3 for instance uh so he begins with this sense that there is a time for being with the lord uh you know it said that he gave his knights to god he gave his days to men uh and you think about just the the shape of his life saint dominic was 50 51 years old when he died and like you know like you identified father jacob bertrand it's only the last five of his years which are spent in doing all of the necessary administrative work for bringing together the order of preachers and missioning those men to the various kind of limits of the earth so he spends a lot of time in preparation in a hidden preparation in a contemplative preparation and then you know at the end of his life you see him return to the lord in a way um in that like you know you think about the way in which saint francis died and he asked himself to be stripped of his clothes and laid on the ground uh his eyes having been blinded by the copious tears that he wept throughout the course of his life st dominic's life looks very similar in shape he died in another man's habit he died in another man's cell because he didn't have a good habit to wear and he didn't have a cell of his own so there's a sense that he naked he came into the world and naked he went forth and that his balance although you know by by some outward auspices he seems you know a little bit imbalanced you know walking through thorn patches with bare feet and things like that that that his balance is something that that comes from god and returns to god and that ultimately he finds his source and stay his security in god and that's something that's something to which we can all aspire and it's something that the grace of god is working in each of our lives albeit in different ways it might not take the same form visibly but it has the same kind of dynamism in our in our heart of hearts yeah one of the um one of the other i guess it's all of a part all of a piece but one of the other things that that i guess i knew i'm sure i knew because you know especially in in the novitia when we were first starting out in our formation in the order we read a lot about saint dominic to get to know him better these kind of things it makes sense uh that when you're starting out you want to get to know him as as well as you can and so i'm sure i read these things but you know in doing research for the book and putting the book together one of the things that i was reminded of and pleasantly so was um say dominic's relationship with especially with the brethren um because even there there was a sense of of balance that he was he was quite stern at times you know he didn't he didn't waver from the mission as as father gregory said earlier when he was sending out the brethren you know that he knew what he was doing that's what he i know what i'm doing um not not letting men get in the way or when men were um you know when there was an issue of obedience or that sort of thing saint dominic was always very stern but he was also known for his charity and his and his love and his fondness of the brothers and his softness with the brothers and his ability to um his ability to coax them into doing the right and the good thing not so much by by words but by just by his witness of his life and who he was and and what he was and how he was and i think that that that um that reality or being able to encounter saint dominic in that way is is still is still on offer it's it's he's his sort of personality is is still on offer for us to meet and to encounter um whether that's through his intercession and becoming a friend of his in prayer or through the order in some way uh you know through whether that's dominican friars or sisters nuns these kind of things but to see that there's there's something uh there's something radiant about saint dominic and the grace and the charism that he that he's given to the church and to the world and something um attractive and ultimately that attractiveness i think is the greatest is the greatest preacher you know that that we that we see someone who is in love and on fire um in love with the lord on fire for the lord and for the gospel and we we want to be part of that and i you know hearing the testimonies of saint dominic's contemporaries and just after his death that certainly seemed to be the case and i think still is today um and is something that is needed in the church and in the world today to to sort of uh what re reissue the the sort of call of of holiness in in a new way through new or and again through through saint dominic in in ways that are particular to him boom so we give thanks to almighty god for the witness for the sanctity of saint dominic the source of our own charism the source of our own apostolic mandate but also a source of grace for the church entire and ultimately one sent to the church entire for the salvation of souls for the glory of god so it's a great gift to receive it's a great gift to communicate so thanks so much for having listened we're grateful for your own efforts in liking and sharing and reviewing the podcast and certainly we benefit from that insofar as more able to hear the word proclaimed uh whether about saint dominic or weird things like post-modern literature or scrupulosity you know we hope that it helps we hope that it's of service we thank also those of you who support the podcast through patreon we're very grateful for that and it has enabled us to grow some small other things with which to conclude uh applications remain open for the camino trip that'll take place late may early june of 2022 and you can find information about that on the website and like i mentioned at the top of the hour we'll be having another live splaining on august 6th at 4 pm eastern standard time and pretty soon here we're going to be moving to just a regular schedule with live splaining where we have it every other week so you can look forward to that and enjoy that as they come up on your youtube feed so if you haven't yet subscribed to our youtube channel be sure to do so and press the bell and that way google will be forced to remind you when some interesting things are afoot so our prayers are for you please pray for us and we ask that through the intercession of saint dominic almighty god might be generous to you and his gifts of many graces all right we'll talk to you soon next time on god splitting cheers thanks for listening to god's planning a work of the dominican friars of the province of saint joseph follow us on facebook twitter and instagram leave a review on your podcast app and visit us at godsplaining.org you

Channel: Godsplaining Podcast

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Keywords: catholic, dominican friars, theology, philosophy, religion, faith, order of preachers, godsplaining, seekers, Truth, preaching, questions, searching, prayer, meditation, frgregorypine, Gregory pine, st dominic, catholic saints, dominican saints, saint, saint dominic

Id: pvW3CH5MzAo

Length: 33min 54sec (2034 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 05 2021