Word to the Wise
Tuesday, November 7, 2006 - All Saints of the Dominican Order
[Sirach 44:1-15 and Mark 10:28-30]Let us now sing the praises of famous persons, our ancestors in their generations.....
When Dominic began the Order of Preachers, he did not start with the friars, but with the cloistered nuns! The celebration of the 800th anniversary of the foundation of the first monastery of cloistered Dominican nuns will begin this Advent. The friars were approved in 1216! So, it looks like we are going to have a LONG celebration ahead of us! Once in awhile, we look back over these 800 years and think of our heros and heroines. Dominic, Catherine of Siena, Thomas Aquinas, Martin De Porres, Rose of Lima.... The list runs to about 200 canonized, I think! In more modern times, I certainly have looked to some of the great theologians of the Order as models: Congar, Chenu, Lagrange..... some of whom suffered much at the hands of narrow church authorities, only to become models of scholarship and holiness later on! All of us in the order, however, know of the "unsung" saints - models of religious life and holiness - who impacted our lives over the years. Today's feast is not just for the publicly recognized "saints." Today we sing of the unsung, too. AMEN