A Glimpse Into the Life of A Dominican Priest

May Father's soul and the souls of all the faithfully departed rest in peace. Amen

The Rose of Peru

Today we remember St. Rose of Lima, the first canonized Saint of the Western hemisphere. She was born in Peru in 1586 and died there at the age of thirty-one. Like many who have felt a call to the Dominican Order over the centuries, Rose initially faced opposition from her family. They refused to let her enter a convent. Rose’s response was to become a Lay Dominican and to live a life of solitude and penance within the confines of her family’s home. She had a great attraction to St. Catherine of Siena, a great love for the Blessed Sacrament, and limitless compassion for the elderly, homeless and the sick, whom she would eventually care for in one of the rooms in her parents’ residence. “When we serve the poor and the sick,” she tells us, “we serve Jesus. We must not fail to help our neighbors, because in them we serve Jesus.”

Rose enthusiastically embraced a life of penance and physical suffering since she also understood that “Apart from the cross, there is no other ladder by which we may get to heaven.”

While most of us today are not willing to voluntarily subject ourselves to the penitential sufferings which Rose sought and welcomed in her short life, all of us will suffer in some fashion during our earthly life. Rather than run away from such challenges, we too should embrace them and transform them into acts of reparation for our own failings and those of others.

I suspect our Peruvian Saint was given a glimpse of the extent to which twenty-first century Catholics would avoid the gift of sacrificial suffering when she wrote the following:

It's Sunday! Give Glory, Honor, Praise and Thanks To The Creator!

The Work of His Hands!

(Photo©Michael Seagriff)

A Glimpse of Our Sister - St. Catherine of Siena

A brief glimpse of St. Catherine of Siena recently featured on Catholic Online:

Real Men Make Sacrifices and Fall Down On Their Knees!

A Few Joyful Dominicans

Just some joyful Dominicans enjoying the Jubilee:

Thrice Blessed - Our Dominican Brethren In Song on the Streets of DC

From the March For Life last Friday in Washington, D.C. - our Dominican brothers filling the public square with heavenly chant. Take a listen to:

 O Lumen

Sub Tuum  

Salve Regina

Blessed Henry Suso, O.P. and the Eucharist

Today we remember Blessed Henry Suso, O.P. (1290-1365) a German Dominican priest, mystic and spiritual writer.

Some suggest that it is difficult to separate fact from fiction when discussing  this gifted Friar. He had as many critics as he did followers. There is a brief but interesting account of his life in Sister Mary Jean Dorcy, O.P.'s classic St. Dominic's Family - Lives of over 300 Famous Dominicans. You can also get a glimpse into his life and writings at New Advent.

His best known work, A Little Book of Eternal Wisdom, is one well worth reading and pondering. Here is a Eucharistic prayer from that book for your use and reflection:

A Prayer to be Said When Thou Goest To Receive Our Lord (Image Source:Willing Shepherds.org) O Thou living fruit, Thou sweet blossom, Thou delicious paradise apple of the blooming fatherly heart, Thou sweet vine of Cyprus in the vineyard of Engaddi, who will give me to receive Thee so worthily this day that Thou shalt desire to come to me, to dwell with me, and never to separate from me!

Podcast - Little Angels and a Tree

The approaching anniversary of the infamous Supreme Court decision, Roe v Wade, reminded me of  two angelic silent preachers who touched my heart and left me filled with hope. Listen here if you want to find out what they did.

Defining Love - Father Bruno Shah, O.P.

Well worth listening to what the good Friar has to say: