Word to the Wise
Wednesday, November 7, 2018 - Wednesday in the 31th Week in Ordinary Time
[Phil 2:12-18 and Luke 14:25-33]But, even if I am poured out as a libation upon the sacrificial service of your faith, I rejoice and share my joy with all of you. In the same way you also should rejoice and share your joy with me. [Philippians]
NOVEMBER 7 ALL SAINTS OF THE ORDER OF PREACHERS [Dominicans]
[Philippians 2:12-18 and Luke 14:25-33 - Roman calendar
Sirach 44:1-5 or 2 Corinthians 6:4-10 and Mark 10:28-30 - Dominican calendar]
I find the scriptures given for this weekday in the Roman calendar very appropriate for the feast given on the Dominican calendar. In addition to the stirring words of St. Paul in Philippians, we have these from the Gospel According to Luke: "If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple." Our Dominican brothers and sisters whose lives mirrored the holiness to which we are all called are celebrated today.
Yesterday we Dominicans celebrated the feast of our Dominican brothers and sisters martyred in Japan. Today we celebrate the feast of all saints of the Order. Although this presumably means those who have been officially "canonized," I have known some Dominicans who qualified anyhow. When I joined the Order of Preachers in 1964, the number of the official ones was not all that big. Pope St. John Paul II added quite a few, some of them in groups, so I have no idea how many there are now. I'm sure the answer is somewhere on the internet. But their number includes St. Dominic (of course!), St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Albert the Great, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Martin De Porres, St. Rose of Lima, St. Pius V, etc. and numerous "blesseds" on their way to bigger status, especially Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati, who is being promoted as a patron of youth. He is also the patron of our Dominican house and campus ministry here in Lubbock, TX at Texas Tech University.
Most of the friars, apostolic sisters, cloistered nuns and Dominican Laity will not have a claim to fame, but we are all called by our vows to strive to live the Dominican ideals in prayer, study. community and ministry that have been the pillars of Dominican life for 800 years. Those who have been "raised to the altar" know well that the rest of us can tell stories about them that allow them to be human and occasionally hard to live with. But we need heroes and heroines to inspire us. Today we salute them all. AMEN