A sect of misery: the “pure ones“
In the 12th century, a movement established itself in certain parts of Europe, especially in southern France, that drew people away from the Catholic faith and into a miserable web of lies: the so-called Cathars (“katharoi“ meaning the “pure ones“) or Albigensians (the French town of Albi being one of their strongholds). They called themselves the “Church of Christ“.
They taught the dualism of all Gnostic, neo-Gnostic, Manichean, and neo-Manichean heresies, according to which there is a good god, or good spiritual principle, that created the soul, and an evil god, or bad spiritual principle, that created all matter.
Therefore, they rejected the creation as evil, and the earth as some sort of hell one must escape (by means of their spiritual path); despised the human body, marriage and sexuality; denied both the humanity and the divinity of Jesus Christ, who in their eyes was a purely spiritual creature with a celestial body unable to suffer and die for real, and did not believe in the resurrection of the body. They agitated against the seven sacraments of the Catholic Church, and used only the New Testament, while doing away with the scriptures of the Old Testament (which were given, according to their teaching, by the evil deity). They adhered to vegetarian or even vegan diets, rigorous fasting, and refused to procreate, even claiming that pregnant women bear a demon inside.
The only pseudo-sacrament they practiced was a sort of “spirit baptism“, the “consolamentum“. It was conferred through the imposition of hands. Through this initiation and salvation rite one could climb up the ladder into the elite class of this “church“: “the perfect“, as they were called.
These “perfect“, by definition, could sin no longer and they lived by the moral codes described above. Meanwhile, the caste beneath them were the “credentes“, the “believers“, who hoped to receive the saving “consolamentum“ (saving from evil matter, delivering one into heaven back to the good god) shortly before death.
It was the promise of this “church“, which these “believers“ supported financially and ideologically, that they would be thus “consoled“ at the end of their lives. This spiritually lower cast of the average Joe and Jane, much more extensive in numbers than the “perfect“, did not have to live by the same rules as the elite. They could still be involved with evil matter. Through long years of preparation one could strive to become part of “the perfect“, even before one‘s death.
The Albigensian heresy featured some more peculiar and characteristic beliefs and practices: the misogynist tendency so common in various forms of heresy, expressed in the notion that the soul is always male; the assumption that it is better to have a concubine than a wife because it is a less permanent involvement; and the idea that suicide by starving yourself to death is a commendable way out. It was a truly demonic drink of poison, designed for the perishing of human bodies and souls.
“Now the Spirit manifestly saith, that in the last times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to spirits of error, and doctrines of devils, speaking lies in hypocrisy, and having their conscience seared, forbidding to marry, to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving by the faithful, and by them that have known the truth. For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be rejected that is received with thanksgiving: For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.“
1 Timothy 4: 1-5
The dog, the fire, the star
In the land of Castille, in the year 1170, a boy was born to the nobleman Felix de Guzmán and to his wife, Blessed Joan of Aza. It was their third son and they named him Dominic due to Joan‘s devotion to Saint Dominic of Silos, a Spanish Benedictine monk of the 11th century, or due to the Latin expression Domini canis – the “Lord‘s dog“.
On a pilgrimage to Silos Joan had prayed for another son, and had received a dream: A dog leaped from her womb, with a flaming torch in his mouth. With this torch he set the world on fire.
When the boy was baptized, his godmother saw a shining star appear on his forehead.
This boy Dominic was meant to become a very gifted, very bright and very fierce and passionate preacher spreading the both clarifying and mystical light of truth and combating heresies until he died in 1221, then passing on the torch to his spiritual sons and daughters through the Order of Preachers established by him and his brothers, which rests on the four pillars of prayer, study, community, and preaching, and is rooted in mottos such as “veritas“ (“truth“), “laudare, benedicere, praedicare“ (“to praise, to bless, to preach“), and “contemplare et contemplata aliis tradere“ (“to contemplate and hand on to others the fruits of contemplation“).
Saint Dominic, his preaching to the Albigensians, and the “Angelic Psalter“
As a young man studying for the priesthood, Saint Dominic gave away all he possessed, even his beloved books of study, to help the poor during a famine that caused the death of many people.
In 1194, Saint Dominic joined the Benedictine order in Osma, becoming their prior seven years later. As an assistant to Bishop Diego of Osma, he started accompanying the bishop on his mission and journeys. On one of their trips, they encountered the destructive force of the Albigensian sect in southern France. The few remaining Catholics in this region lived in fear of the heretics, who were backed by powerful men.
Some time later, in the year 1204, Pope Innocent III commissioned Bishop Diego and Dominic to help with the forlorn and up to then unsuccessful mission of combating the heresy and calling the people back home into the arms of the one true Church and faith. It turned out to be a very difficult task.
Saint Dominic labored for this cause for eleven long years, together with those brothers who would eventually become the first group of the Order of Preachers, when they chose for themselves the Rule of Saint Augustine at Prouille in 1216, built their first monastery at the chapel of Saint Romanus in Toulouse, and received papal approval from Pope Honorius III, the successor of Pope Innocent III.
When difficulties and questions arose in Saint Dominic‘s life, the Mother of God would come to his aid. In 1206, he established a women‘s convent at Prouille, after having received visions from the Blessed Virgin Mary, who told him that there “his life‘s work“ would begin, and after having experienced the miracle of the conversion of a group of quite stubborn women. These women became the nuns at Prouille who were endowed with the task to pray and offer sacrifices for the success of the preaching mission of Saint Dominic and his brothers.
During the years of the Crusade against the Albigensians, which started in 1208, Saint Dominic followed the trace of the Catholic armies to preach to the surviving heretics, to reconcile them to the Church, and to re-establish Catholic life in the towns and villages freed from the grasp of the heretical movement. But still, at times his efforts were fruitless.
One problem standing in the way of evangelization was the usual problem: The ones professing and proclaiming the true Catholic faith were not practicing what they preached, and lacked in true holiness.
Saint Dominic was different, which was beneficial for the purpose of his missions. He strived to live in a very penitential way. His accomodation and clothing were always modest. He refused to sleep on a bed. He walked around in sandals, which he took off at the edge of a town, entering into it barefooted. While he was walking, with nothing but a staff and a bundle containing a copy of the Gospel of Matthew and of the Epistles of Saint Paul, he continually prayed and meditated upon the Word of God. On his deathbead in the year 1221, he exhorted his brothers to humility and charity, virtues he himself had exemplified for them perfectly.
In the year 1214, he received a special weapon from the Blessed Virgin Mary, as she appeared to him accompanied by three angels. Saint Dominic had put himself under harsh penitential practices for three days in a row, whipping himself bloody until slipping into a coma. There, in the woods, Mary came to help him again, speaking to him words as such:
“Dear Dominic, do you know which weapon the Blessed Trinity wants to use to reform the world?“
Apparition of the Blessed Virgin Mary to Saint Dominic
“I want you to know that, in this kind of warfare, the battering ram has always been the Angelic Psalter (…). Therefore, if you want to reach these hardened souls and win them over to God, preach my Psalter.“
It was the Rosary, “Our Lady‘s psalter“, that was given to Saint Dominic both as a spiritual weapon meriting graces for the conversion of sinners and as a catechism tool, through which he could teach the heretics the essential mysteries of the Catholic faith.
The Rosary contains the truth of the good news of the Messiah Jesus, born of the Virgin Mary, the truth of everything the Albigensian heresy denied in a nutshell – in brief and essential prayers on a simple string of beads.
“The new wine of Dominican spirituality“
In recent days and weeks I read two books dealing with Saint Dominic de Guzmán, the man through whom the Church received a new order and a new spiritual tradition in the beginning of the 13th century.
One of them is a tale for children or teenagers, written by Mary Fabyan Windeatt, that narrates the most important events of his life, and the other one is a bit more scholarly book by one of many of Saint Dominic‘s spiritual sons, an Irish man by the name of Paul Murray, member of the Order of Preachers.
Paul Murray‘s book features four essays in which we undertakes to hint at some of the distinctive marks, charisms, and tasks of the spiritual tradition whose father Saint Dominic is. Having digested them, I began to wonder how I could share some of its content with you in a clearly laid out and catchy way.
Let us return to the earliest years of Saint Dominic de Guzmán in the land of Castille: Imagine him as a little boy, a baby boy even, smiling. And then picture this smiling boy alongside the two visions received by his mother and his godmother: the vision of the dog with the blazing torch in his mouth, and the vision of the star shining on his forehead. This picture – or rather triple picture – will guide us through five flavors of the new wine of Dominican spirituality.
That is the title of Paul Murray‘s book which features a preface by Timothy Radcliffe OP worth quoting here to lead you into the second part of this article: reflecting upon the gifts of the Dominican tradition, and thereby understanding more deeply how it is the healthy and powerful anti-thesis to each and every tendency and tenet of the miserable sect of the “pure ones“, or to any even remotely similar idea or practice haunting the Church today, as gnosticism – or some sort of hyper-spiritualizing – rears its head again and again.
“In this book Paul Murray OP shows that there is indeed such a thing as ‘Dominican spirituality‘. It is not about special ways of praying. It is about being alive in God and for others. It is from this life that our preaching springs. This wonderful begins with a quotation from the second Master of the Order, Blessed Jordan of Saxony, in which he talks of the gospel as the new wine, ‘the wine of everlasting joy‘. And the book concludes with the fourteenth-century Dominican mystic, St Catherine of Siena, advising her brothers: ‘Let us behave like the drunkard who does not think of himself but only of the wine he has drunk and of the wine that remains to be drunk!‘
Timothy Radcliffe OP: Preface to Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. v-viii
Surprisingly and refreshingly, the drinking of wine emerges as a key metaphor for our earliest brothers and sisters. They clearly enjoyed a good drink. Indeed St Dominic once, after a late night conference, insisted to his sisters that they ‘drink deeply‘, and they all did! Jordan of Saxony, when he preached in England, compared God‘s longing for our company with a friend who wants to share a drink: ‘Nowadays people say, I think it would be great if you could come to me and have a drink with me.‘ And it‘s just like that with the Lord.‘ Drinking wine suggests the exuberant and ecstatic quality of our relationship with God. We are carried outside ourselves, and become self-forgetful, joyful.
Drinking frees us from inhibition, and these early friars and sisters were amazingly free. They preached the gospel of Christ‘s freedom. (…)
Murray shows that at the heart of this Dominican spirituality was a profound joy, not just in God but in each other and in the people whom they met. (…) The foundations of this joy were fraternity, prayer and study. Prayer, in the Dominican tradition, has usually been seen as essentially simple. We talk to God as to a friend; we spontaneously share with God whatever is on our minds, our joys and fears, asking for what we desire and giving thanks for what we receive. (…)
Murray shows us the profound humanity of these early friars and sisters. They were down to earth and vital. This is a spirituality which is rooted in our lives, in our fundamental desires, in our pain and joy, in our humanity. Dominic‘s opposition to the heresy of Albigensianism was not that of a narrow fanatic but of a man whose love of the Creator overflowed in a love of everything to which God gave existence. He could not accept their rejection of the goodness of creation. (…)
I am delighted that Paul Murray shares with us in this book his understanding of Dominican spirituality. It is urgently needed today in a Church which sometimes tends to be gloomy and pessimistic, introverted and fearful.“
1) The boy: Simplicity
If we think of the simplicity little children have, we might catch a glimpse of the simplicity in charity and piety that might be one of the main strings at the resounding heart of the Dominican tradition.
“One of the great merits, in my view, of the Dominican contemplative tradition is its dogged resistance to the esoteric aura or spiritual glamour that tends to surround the subject of contemplation. (…)
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 7-9
Without exception I find that, in the prayer-lives of the Dominican preachers I most admire, there is always something of that common neediness, and that Gospel simplicity. When at prayer, these preachers are not afraid to speak to God directly, as to a friend. (…)
For is it not the case that we are encouraged in the Gospel by Christ to pray with great simplicity of heart and straightforwardness? When, over the years, Dominicans have found themselves confronted with detailed methods and techniques of meditation, and with long lists of instructions of what to do in meditation and what not to do, their reaction has almost always been the same: they instinctively feel that something has gone wrong.“
“He (Dominic) possessed an exuberance of nature that, far from being suppressed by a life of prayer and penance, seems in fact to have been wonderfully awakened and released. (…) At prayer in particular he could hardly, it seems, contain himself. Often he would cry out to God at the top of his voice. (…) So Dominic prays with all that he is – body and soul. He prays privately with intense and humble devotion. And, with that same deep faith and profound emotion, he prays in public the prayer of the Mass. Although the intensity of Dominic‘s faith and feeling may be unusual, as well as the extraordinary length of his night vigils, for the rest his prayer seems indistinguishable from that of any ordinary devout Christian man or woman. His prayer is never in any way esoteric. It is always simple, always ecclesial.
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 11-13
Obviously, at the core of St Dominic‘s life, there was a profound contemplative love of God. But reading through the early accounts of his prayer-life, what also immediately impresses is the place accorded to others – to the afflicted and oppressed – within the act of contemplation itself. (…) when he prays, Dominic remembers to intercede for those people he knows to be in need, and for sinners especially. (…)
Writing at St Jacques in Paris, sometime in the early thirteenth century, an anonmyous Dominican author noted that ‘among the things a man ought to see (in contemplation) are the needs of his neighbour‘ and also ‘how great is the weakness of every human being‘. And he noted further: ‘Understand from what you know about yourself the condition of your neighbour (…). And what you see in Christ and in the world and in your neighbour, write that in your heart.‘ These lines are memorable for the compassionate attention they give to the neighbour in the context of contemplation. But I would like to think also that their emphasis on true self-knowledge, and their simple openness to Christ, to the neighbour, and to the world, strike a distinctly Dominican note.“
“In contrast to a spirituality which would rely perhaps too much on the determination of the will to effect changes in the world for the greater glory of God, the Dominican emphasis on grace – on the happy recognition, that is, of God‘s own saving initiative and of God‘s ‘mad‘ love for the world – makes for a much less uptight and a far more joyful and spontaneous kind of spirituality.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 25
“I remember, just after I had joined the Dominican Order, when I was still a novice, putting a question about the distinctive character of Dominican spirituality to one of the older priests in the community, a wonderful man called Cathal Hutchinson. My question was a typical novice question, as earnest and sincere as it was naive. ‘What,‘ I asked, ‘is the secret of Dominican contemplation?‘ Father Cathal hesitated a moment. He smiled at me. Then he said: ‘Brother Paul, never tell the Carmelites or the Jesuits, but we have no secret other than the Gospel secret!‘“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 28
The brilliancy of the Rosary, too, is its simplicity, containing “the Gospel secret“ and the two essential prayers of the Our Father and the Ave Maria – simple enough for the young child who is just learning how to pray, and simple enough for the old and half-forgetful grandmother in her rocking chair.
2) The smile: Cheerfulness and joy
Now see the face of the little child in your imagination light up with pure joy. And you do, indeed, see Saint Dominic:
“‘(H)is face was always radiant,‘ we are told, and ‘(B)y his cheerfulness he easily won the love of everybody. (…) ‘(A) kind of radiance shone forth from his forehead and between his eyebrows, which drew everyone to venerate and love him. He always appeared cheerful and happy.‘“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 50
Such joy is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, and a fruit of the Gospel simplicity. It is the happiness, the blessedness of the Beatitudes, of living in and practicing the New Covenant in Christ.
The second Master of the Order, Jordan of Saxony, wrote in a letter to the nun Diana, who was a spiritual daughter of Saint Dominic personally befriended with him, to “accept with joy whatever sad things may come to us“ (ibid. p. 57).
The desire for joy and happiness is recognized and cherished by Dominicans as a central – even the central – driving force in us human beings.
“St Thomas, like St Dominic before him, was deeply grounded in the teaching of St Paul and in the Gospel of Matthew. He understood that the Beatitudes and the Sermon on the Mount represent God‘s answer to our human search for happiness. (…) Morality, then, is placed not so much under the rubric of obligation by St Thomas but rather under the rubric of happiness. (…)
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 75-76
So Thomas, like the great Augustine, refuses to have the question of happiness set aside. For both men, morality begins with happiness, and is a search for happiness. ‘There is no doubt about it,‘ Augustine says, ‘we all want to be happy. Everyone will agree with me even before the words are out of my mouth… so let us see if we can find the best way to achieve it.‘ Unfortunately, very seldom if ever, in the manual theologies of later centuries, do we find such a frank and honest admission of our human thirst for happiness. But it is precisely this thirst which contemplatives like Aquinas and Augustine, Eckhart and Catherine, never for a moment allowed themselves to forget.“
Paul Murray tells the story how the contemplative nun Mechthild of Magdeburg received a vision on the feast day of Saint Dominic that changed her own attitude toward laughing, which she had regarded to be something wrong somehow.
“The Lord explained to her, first of all, that Dominic was a great example of moderation, that he never troubled his fellow Dominicans ‘with things arising from some whim of his own‘ and that, in fact, ‘he often improved the food to help and show affection for his brethren, so that the young brothers might not think bank on the world and so that the older ones might not succumb on the way.‘ But then, addressing directly the subject of laughter, the Lord added, and the sentence is memorable, ‘whenever Dominic laughed, he did so with the true delight of the Holy Spirit.‘“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 65
In Saint Catherine of Siena‘s The Dialogue, one reads how God passes on to her soul that
“the Dominican Order is ‘in itself … wholly delightful‘. Dominic, he tells her, built his ‘ship‘ both ‘very spacious‘ and also ‘very happy‘. (…) So ‘both the perfect and the not-so-perfect fare well on this ship‘!“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 51-52
There is a “humanness“, a down-to-earth and clement spirit in the Dominican tradition that has a heart and a place even for the “not-so-perfect“ – which would be you and me, then.
In this regard it is worth taking a look at the remarkable story of a man called Peter of Aubenas, a story that appears in the Vitae Fratrum, the account of the lives of the first Friars Preachers. This man Peter wanted to join the Friars, but then met “a notably austere group of men called the Waldensians“ (ibid. p. 54).
The Waldensians were another heritical group around since the late 12th century, mostly in France and Italy. The were called Waldensians because of their founder Peter Waldo, a wealthy merchant who gave away all his property in 1173. Some of their teachings included that holy water, or sacramentals in general, have no power and efficacy, that pilgrimages are of no avail, that the Church‘s teaching on purgatory is wrong, and that the Pope is, in fact, the “anti-Christ“. In fact, they are often regarded as “forerunners“ of Protestantism.
“As the text puts it, Peter ‘saw in them (the Waldensians) more outward signs of humility and of the virtues of piety, while he considered the friars too cheerful and showy (…). In an anguish of indecision, Peter begged God ‘to reveal to him, in his mercy, what he ought to do in this dilemma‘. Well, he got his answer, but in a dream. The text says: ‘he imagined that he was walking along a road with a dark wood on the left side of it, in which he saw the Waldensians all going their separate ways, with sad, solemn faces.‘ But, on the other side of the road, after walking for some time beside a very beautiful high wall, he ‘at last came to a gate‘. When he looked in through the gate, he saw, in contrast to the dark, solemn wood, ‘an exquisite meadow, planted with trees and colourful with flowers‘. In the meadow, ‘he saw a crowd of Friars Preachers in a ring, with joyful faces raised towards heaven‘. And he saw that ‘one of them was holding the Body of Christ in his upraised hands‘. Peter was overwhelmed. The text says that, when he woke up, he ‘found himself bathed in tears … his heart joyful‘.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 54
And so Peter of Aubenas joined the Dominicans. It is a very telling story, isn‘t it? The dream reveals to this young man, that despite the “outward signs of humility and the virtues of piety“ the truth at the heart of the walk of the heretics is actually a “going their separate ways, with sad, solemn faces“ – a life stuck in a lack of community, and a lack of joy.
Finally he understands what it is that gives the Friars Preachers their cheerfulness, their paradise-like state: the Body and Blood of Christ, the Eucharist – the heavenly food, the Bread of Life which the heretics do not have. The “outward“ piety of the heretics is of no avail. Ultimately, without the real presence of Christ and without the unity of His Church, it is without life and without fruitfulness – just a “dark wood“.
“Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you are like to whited sepulchres, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men’s bones, and of all filthiness. So you also outwardly indeed appear to men just; but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.“
Matthew 23: 27-28
It is interesting to read this description of the Waldensians in Peter of Aubenas‘ dream as men with “sad, solemn faces“ alongside a quote by G. K. Chesterton which Paul Murray has also included in his essay Dominicans and Happiness.
“‘(S)olemnity,‘ he writes, ‘flows out of men naturally, but laughter is a leap. It is easy to be heavy: hard to be light. Satan fell by the force of gravity.‘“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 49
The same G. K. Chesterton notes that “a characteristic of the great saints is their power of levity“ (ibid. p. 50). There are accounts on how Saint Dominic‘s feet were once being lifted up from the ground during his praying of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
And so two kinds of sadness and two kinds of happiness rival with one another. There is a superficial and frivolous “merriness“, that in fact is no true happiness; and there is the deep joy of the heart that has found rest in God.
And there is a fruitful weeping and mourning, compunction of heart, and openness to receive and embrace suffering. This is a sadness that is not antithetical to true joy, but paradoxically aligned with it. The promise therein is receiving the very comfort of God.
“They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. Going they went and wept, casting their seeds. But coming they shall come with joyfulness, carrying their sheaves.“
Psalm 125 (Vulgate): 5-7
“Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.“
Matthew 5: 5
At the same time, there is some kind of sterile sadness, heaviness, and gravity that is harmful to our souls and even a characteristic mark of the effect of evil spirits, who themselves are bereft of all joy because they are forever bereft of the beatific vision of God. Saint Paul in his second epistle to the Church at Corinth speaks of these two different types of sadness:
“For the sorrow that is according to God worketh penance, steadfast unto salvation; but the sorrow of the world worketh death.“
2 Corinthians 7: 10
As disarming weapons against both the spirit of “separation“ and of “solemn sadness“ which Peter of Aubenas was led to recognize in the way of the Waldensians, we can make use of some interesting and delightful teachings of Saint Thomas Aquinas. Firstly, in his lecture on the Gospel of Matthew, he incorporates a famous aphorism by Aristotle which everyone of us should memorize very well:
“Anyone who doesn‘t need company (…) is either greater than a man, and is a God, or lesser than a man, and is a beast.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 150-151
Besides, Saint Thomas teaches that “play (…) is necessary for the intercourse of human life“ and that “an unrelenting seriousness indicates a lack of virtue since ‘it wholly despises play, which is as necessary for human life as rest is‘“ (ibid. p. 69). Once again he follows Aristotle in that, who called “eutrapelia“ – or “playfulness“ – an authentic virtue.
“He writes: ‘Those who are lacking in fun, and who never say anything funny or humorous, but instead give grief to those who make jokes, not accepting even the modest fun of others, are morally unsound (vitiosi) and, in the view of the philosopher (Aristotle), are rough and boorish (duri et agrestes).‘“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 68
Humility and humour are brothers after all, raised in the same ground: the earth beneath our feet, and together, these brothers are lifting us up gently. And so it is not a virtue at all to take ourselves too seriously. If we take ourselves too seriously, we do not have healthy eyes with which to behold reality – because we have no vision going out beyond ourselves.
Saint Dominic once dealt with one of his brothers by the name Bertrand, who was caught up in circling around himself, in a refreshingly insightful and gentle way: Bertrand “was weeping too much over his sins, and ‘tormenting himself excessively‘“ (ibid. p. 50).
“He commanded Bertrand ‘not to weep for his own sins, but for those of others‘. And ‘his words had such a powerful effect‘, we‘re told, ‘that thereafter Bertrand wept profusely for others, but was unable to weep for himself even when he wanted to‘!“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 50-51
3) The star: The light of learning and of truth
The star upon little Dominic‘s forehead at his baptism – what does it signify? Nothing else, I‘d like to suggest, but the light of learning and of the mystical vision of the truth of God.
“Actual goodness, it is true, can certainly be considered as the holiness of the heart, since from there charity springs. But thinking, serious thinking about the Gospel, and about the world we are living in, can itself be a form of holiness – and a necessary form. Accordingly, Dominicans in every age tend to insist that there can be no serious awakening to God without an awakening in the mind.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 80
“Jordan writes: ‘(Dominic‘s) eagerness to imbibe the streams of holy scripture was so intense and so unremitting that he spent whole nights almost without sleep, so untiring was his desire to study.‘ Moreover, since ‘he accepted the Lord‘s commandments so warmly,‘ and since ‘his love and piety fertilized whatever he learned,‘ Dominic, we are told, ‘was able to penetrate the mysteries of difficult theological questions with the humble understanding of his heart‘. (…) One of the witnesses at Dominic‘s canonization process, Brother John of Spain, remarked that he ‘always carried around with him the Gospel of Matthew and the letters of Paul‘, and ‘studied them so much that he knew them by heart.‘ (…) John of Spain tells us further that he ‘always advised and exhorted his brothers to study both the Old and New Testaments‘. (…)
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 81-83
Jordan writes: ‘He began to develop a passionate appetite for God‘s words, finding them ‘sweeter than honey to his mouth.‘“
Jordan of Saxony alludes to a passage in the book of Ezekiel that is emblematic of the value the Dominicans place on studying the Word – in order to preach the Word.
“And he said to me: Son of man, eat all that thou shalt find: eat this book, and go speak to the children of Israel. And I opened my mouth, and he caused me to eat that book: And he said to me: Son of man, thy belly shall eat, and thy bowels shall be filled with this book, which I give thee. And I did eat it: and it was sweet as honey in my mouth. And he said to me: Son of man, go to the house of Israel, and thou shalt speak my words to them. For thou art not sent to a people of a profound speech, and of an unknown tongue, but to the house of Israel.“
Ezekiel 3: 1-5
The prayerful study of God‘s Word in Sacred Scripture, of Sacred Tradition, and of the teachings of the Magisterium of the Church is a necessary precondition for the apostolic mission of the Order of Preachers.
“Dominic, in his attempts to refute the errors of the Cathar heretics in Provence, had made this discovery himself. He came to realize that, in terms of apostolic strategy, it would not be wise simply to deliver moral exhortations to the people, and ignore the challenge to orthodoxy. What was needed, if the truth of God‘s Word was to be defended, and the Christian vision upheld, was an accurate and profound knowledge of scripture and of church teaching. And the only way to acquire such knowledge was through rigorous study. (…) According to The Dialogue of St Catherine of Siena, in marked contrast to Francis of Assisi, whose hallmark was poverty, the hallmark of Dominic (though himself a poor mendicant) was ‘learning‘ (la scientia). In The Dialogue, the Father explains to Catherine that it was precisely ‘in order to stamp out the errors that were rising up at that time‘ that Dominic built the foundation of his Order on ‘the light of learning‘.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 85
According to Saint Thomas Aquinas, “contemplative study is ‘the most delightful of all human pursuits‘“ and those who follow “the pursuit of wisdom are ‘the happiest anyone can be in this life‘“ (ibid. p. 108).
Remember, though, once more that Saint Dominic gave all his books away to help the poor during a famine while he was studying for the priesthood. He said, “I refuse (…) to study dead skins while men are dying of hunger“ (ibid. p. 120).
“The sharp awareness of human need in that statement springs not only from the tenderness of Dominic‘s heart but also, I suspect, from countless days and nights of devoted study and contemplation.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 120-121
Thus, the learning and wisdom required to be of service to one’s neighbor goes far beyond mere “book knowledge“. It is all about an attentiveness to even the smallest kernel of natural reality and revelation, and about the broad, wide, and deep supernatural vision of faith.
“The study undertaken by Dominicans should focus attention both on eternal things and on the natural world around us. Humbert of Romans, in his treatise on preaching, says that all creation is itself ‘a book‘ and that ‘those who know how to read this book will draw from it many things which are very serviceable for helping people to grow‘.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 124
“Asked once by someone who had been particularly impressed by his learning and his preaching which books he studied most, Dominic replied that he ‘studied more in the book of charity than in any other‘ (…). By the phrase ‘the book of charity‘ Dominic is referring to the saving message of God‘s love revealed on the cross. In similar vein, Catherine of Siena speaks, in one of her letters, of the event of Christ‘s death as ‘the book of life‘.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 125
And Jordan of Saxony wrote to Diana, the nun, that she shall read in “the book of life“:
“‘(Y)ou find it written with a strange beauty when you gaze at Jesus your Savior stretched out like a sheet of parchment on the Cross inscribed with wounds, illustrated in his own loving blood. Where else, I ask you, my dearest, is there a comparable book of love to read from?‘“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 126
4) The dog: Openness, dynamism, freedom
A dog with a torch in his mouth… There is one story in Sacred Scripture that prominently features a dog: It is the story of young Tobias who is accompanied on his journey, that ultimately is a journey toward saving and marrying Sara who has been haunted by a demonic spirit, by the archangel Saint Raphael – and a dog.
Saint Dominic and his preaching brothers were always journeying, always on the move – due to their apostolic mission for the sake of the Church and the salvation of souls. The dog seems to represent this agility and dynamism of the Order of Preachers, its openness to the world and the present times, including a willingness to get in touch with its “dirt“ as well.
“Dominic, it is clear, possessed a strong instinct for adventure. He was daring both by nature and by grace. Dante calls him ‘il santo atleta‘, the holy athlete. No matter how difficult or unforeseen the challenge of the hour, he was not afraid to take enormous risks for the sake of the Gospel. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that within a few years it could be said of the young friars who followed in his wake, and whom he himself had dispersed far and wide to preach the gospel, that they had made the ocean their cloister.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 89
“The contemplative apostle in the Dominican tradition, the authentic preacher, does not call down curses on the sinful world. But, instead, conscious of his or her own weakness, and humbly identified, therefore, with the world‘s need, the Dominican calls down a blessing.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 20
“Because it is a preacher‘s vocation, the Dominican vocation is, in its essence, a dynamic vocation. It is shaped, therefore, not only by its own pre-established laws and constitutions, but by the demands of history and the needs of the hour. (…) For, in the preacher‘s life, the pattern of religious observance is never static or fixed, but always forms part of a life lived in response to the needs of others and to the demands of the Gospel at any given moment.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 43-44
5) The torch: Fervor and enthusiasm
Now, finally, the torch the dog carries in his mouth – setting the world on fire: Another characteristic of the Dominican tradition we will take a look at is a certain fervor and enthusiasm in living and preaching the Word that is able to kindle or rekindle a flame in others.
“One witness at the canonization process remarked that Dominic was ‘so enthusiastic as a preacher that by day and by night, in churches, houses, fields, on the road, everywhere, he wanted to preach the word of the Lord and he encouraged the brethren to do the same and not to talk about anything except God.‘ His compassion extended, we are told, ‘not only to the faithful, but also to pagans and unbelievers and even the damned in hell, and he wept a great deal for them.‘“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 89
“At one point in the Vitae Fratrum, the Dominicans – these ‘new-comers‘ – are said to be not only bearers of the ‘wine‘ of Gospel truth, but also gatherers of the ‘honey‘ of human wisdom and learning. The text itself says that they are ‘dispensers of the wine and honey, since they blend in their preaching the sweetness of divine things with the pleasantness of human learning‘. And, when they ‘mix the honey with the wine, and pour wine upon the honey, and (give) it to the people to drink,‘ the effect is something great. In the symbolic words of one ecstatic account, those among the people who take this new drink, begin ‘to run to and fro as if beside themselves with its sweetness‘.
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 146
“Among the most famous of all the early preaches in the Order was Jordan of Saxony himself. According to the ancient account, he ‘overflowed with enthusiastic talk, brilliant with apt and powerful illustrations‘. And he quite consciously worked at getting his hearers ‘drunk‘ on the Word. (…) As a direct result of listening to Jordan, an amazing number of young men joined the Dominican Order. They had obviously become intoxicated with ‘the Spirit‘s wine‘.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 136-137
“In the view, then, of St Catherine of Siena and Blessed Johannes Tauler, both sobriety and drunkenness are needed: sobriety, so that we may stay close always to the knowledge of our own limitations, and drunkenness, so that we may ‘get rid of all coldness‘, and allow ourselves to become completely addicted to the Word of God and to the task of preaching the Word.“
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 162
The Dominican preaching tends to be fiery, lively and intoxicating. A giftedness with words, with communication, with passing on knowledge to others in pleasant ways seems to be an outstanding feature of their contributions.
As I read in my Tree of Life Bible in the book of the Song of Songs the other day, I came across a verse that somehow reminded me of the archetype of the gifted preacher who awakens his brothers and sisters by serving good and strong drinks. In the Vulgate this verse is rendered differently, which is why I am quoting here the very version I read in my Bible, a translation based on Hebrew manuscripts.
“May your mouth be like the best wine, going down smoothly for my beloved, causing the lips of sleepers to speak.“
Song of Songs 7: 10
Paul Murray tries to explain why the imagery of “drunkenness“ and of “drinking wine“ appealed to the early Dominicans so much, that they made use of it frequently “with a distinct enthusiasm“ (ibid. p. 165):
“They were drawn to it, I suspect, because it responded so well to their sense of the Gospel. Their spirituality was not something tense or introverted or self-preoccupied, but rather joyous and expansive. And so the image of a group of friends or companions drinking together would naturally have appealed to them. Wine or drink is an image of the goodness and sweetness of life. When St Dominic was alive, many of the ascetics of his time – and I am thinking here particularly of the Albigensians – regarded it, as they regarded food and sex, as something evil. But St Dominic, with his own deep understanding of the goodness of all creation, clearly accepted it as something wholesome and good. (…)
Paul Murray OP: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality. A Drink Called Happiness, Bloomsbury 2006, p. 165-166
The wine of truth which Christ gives us to drink is also a wine of astonishment. What we preach, then, are not just truths about God. We preach a wine of truth we have actually tasted ourselves, and have drunk with living faith and joy.
The medieval Dominicans, being not only celebrants of grace but also defenders of nature, clearly loved the image of drinking and drunkenness because it gave them a vivid way of speaking about preaching – about the need, first, to become ‘drunk‘ on the Word, and then about the effects of that encounter with God: the ecstasy of self-forgetfulness, the grace of new joy, the compulsion to share that joy with others, and the gifts of renewed hope and courage.“
Saint Dominic de Guzmán, pray for us!