Cardinal Kasper in Oxford

Cardinal Walter Kasper, President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, was in Oxford recently for two days. The main reason for his visit was to deliver the inaugural lecture in a new series organised by the Catholic Halls of the University in honour of John Henry Newman. On Sunday 4 May, the Cardinal began his visit with dinner at Blackfriars hosted by the Dominican community.






The next day, Monday 5 May, Cardinal Kasper fielded a broad range of questions from the theology faculty and students of the University. Events took place at Christ Church College, at Greyfriars and at St Benet's. In the afternoon, he delivered the inaugural John Henry Newman Lecture to a full auditorium at St John's College. Entitled 'The timeliness of talking about God', the Cardinal expressed the need for good theological discourse as a response to secularisation and 'the new atheism'. We hope to have excerpts from his talk online in due course. The lecture was followed by a reception in Blackfriars.






Above, Cardinal Kasper with fr Richard Finn OP, who is Regent of Studies.

Blackfriars Spring Fayre

On Sunday 27 April, as part of our on-going fund-raising efforts for the Oxford Priory Renewal Fund, we held our first Spring Fayre in Blackfriars. Organised by members of the 9:30 congregation, and with help and support from all those who come to Mass in Blackfriars, this was a wonderful opportunity for the whole community to come together and put on an enjoyable event. It raised over £2,500 for the project, and Godzdogz readers are warmly invited to help us in our fund-raising efforts and consider making a secure online donation at our fund-raising site.

Below are more photos from the Spring Fayre. Thanks to all who helped to make the event such a resounding success.

Celebrating 450 years of Dominican life

Each year, near the feast of St Catherine of Siena, the Dominican Sisters of the Bushey Congregation celebrate the jubilees of their sisters. This year four sisters mark their golden jubilee of profession, three their diamond jubilee and one sister her platinum (70th!) anniversary of profession. This was a very joyful celebration of what Sr Anne, the Prioress General, called '450 years of fidelity'. She thanked the sisters for being themselves and for the generosity of their service over so many years in many different places. As well as sisters from England, members of the congregation from South Africa, Argentina and Rome were present, as were sisters from the Congregation's new foundations in Glasgow and Wales. Some of the friars were also present including Brothers Graham, Mark and Gregory, the novices from Cambridge.


This year's 'Golden Girls' were Srs Hyacinth, Aquinata, Elizabeth and Raymunda, pictured here (l. to r.) with Sr Anne, Prioress General of the Congregation (second from left).


Srs Maria Julia, Francesca and Letitia celebrate their diamond jubilees (1948-2008).



Sr Margaret Mary celebrates 70 years of profession (1938-2008). We wish her, and all the jubilarians, many congratulations and thank them for the witness of their lives.

Catherine of Siena: Prayer and Action

Catherine of Siena was born Caterina di Giacomo di Benincasa in 1347 in the Fontebranda district of Siena, the twenty-fourth of twenty-five children. From a very early age, she had a great devotion to God and a passion for the truth. Her desire for the truth seems to have been greatly influenced by the preaching of the local Dominicans. Because of this desire for VERITAS, Catherine decided to take the habit of the Dominican Order at the age of eighteen while living a life of solitary prayer and penance in her family home only venturing outside to attend the celebration of Mass at the Dominican convento. It was during this time that she entered into contemplative union with God, which resulted in her mystical espousal to Christ.

Through her experiences of God in prayer, Catherine was able to realize the intimate connection between contemplation and service of her neighbors. Shortly after her mystical espousal, she joined the Mantellate, a group of women who were affiliated with the Order of Saint Dominic and wore the habit but lived in their own homes, serving the needs of the poor. The union of contemplation and action in the life of Catherine is important for our reflection on the Christian life. It demonstrates for us that prayer and action are not separate realities but are intimately woven together into the continuous activity of discipleship. In her Dialogue, she states that God told her “I ask you to love me the way I love you. I know that you cannot do this gratuitously but out of duty, this is why I place your neighbors in your path so that you may love them and so that you can do for them what you cannot do for me…”

The connection between mystical experience and involvement in the concerns and affairs of the world is very clear and very striking in Catherine's case. In 1363, at the age of 15 or so, she emerged from a period of intense solitude to get involved again in the affairs of her family. In 1366, at the age of 19, she experienced a spiritual espousal or 'marriage' to Christ after which she became involved in the life of her city, Siena. In 1370, at the age of 23, she experienced a mystical 'death' and we find her getting involved in the affairs of Tuscany and of Italy generally. Finally in 1375, at the age of 28, she received the stigmata and we see her becoming a figure on the European stage. She becomes the ambassador of Florence to the papal court at Avignon, entreats the Pope to return to Rome, and becomes in turn the ambassador of the Pope to Florence.

Rarely has any Christian, at one and the same time, been so completely immersed in political and pastoral activity while living a life of profound, mystical contemplation. Her mystical experiences are recorded in her Dialogue while her letters show her to be a pastoral theologian and spiritual director of exceptional wisdom and compassion. The eminent Irish Dominican, Archbishop William Barden (the centenary of whose birth we celebrate this year), regarded Catherine of Siena as the greatest of all Dominicans, women or men, perhaps, he suggested, even greater than Saint Dominic himself!

In essence, Catherine reveals to us that contemplation and action form the seamless garment of faith, which all the baptized receive in the Sacrament of Baptism and which we are called to exercise in our daily discipleship as Catherine did through her tireless prayer and work on behalf of peace in the Church and in society.

Quotation from Catherine's Dialogue is from the translation of Susanne Noffke OP, published at New York in 1980

Join us for Compline

COMPLINE BEGINS AGAIN ON WEDNESDAY 23 APRIL 2008 ...

Quiz Night at Blackfriars

As part of our fund-raising for the Priory Renewal Fund, a Quiz Night was held in the refectory at Blackfriars, Oxford on 1 March. The quiz was organised by Br David Rocks OP with help from members of our 9.30am Mass congregation. As it was the eve of Laetare Sunday, the spirit of good fun and laughter seemed especially appropriate. Below are some photos from this event:

Lenten Vocations Day for Men and Women

Blogging Colloquium at Oxford Chaplaincy

Recognising the recent upsurge in blogs and blog readers in the world, a special Colloquium has been organised by the Oxford University Newman Society, which will be held at the Catholic Chaplaincy on Friday, February 15, 2008 from 6-8:30 pm on the theme, ‘Blogging and the Church.’

This event will be quite informal and interactive and will discuss the nature of blogs: —What effect have blogs had on the Church? Who writes blog, who reads them? Are blogs an efficient way to disseminate information? What are the responsibilities of bloggers? Are blogs social forces?

The speakers are:

Rev’d Fr John T Zuhlsdorf, author of ‘What does the Prayer Really Say?’

Rev’d Fr John Hunwicke, author of ‘Fr Hunwicke’s Liturgical Notes’

Br Lawrence Lew OP, ‘contributor on ‘Godzdogz’

Matthew Doyle, author of ‘Lacrimarum Valle’

Directions to the Oxford University Catholic Chaplaincy can be found at:
http://www.catholic-chaplaincy.org.uk/how_to_find_us.html

For more information please contact, Yaqoob K Bangash, President, Oxford
University Newman Society: yaqoob.bangash@keble.ox.ac.uk

Recent Ordinations

On 15 December 2007, fr Didier Croonenberghs OP, was ordained a priest by Cardinal Daneels in Brussels. Fr Didier is a member of the Dominican General Vicariate of Southern Belgium, and is currently studying theology at Oxford University. Below are some photos from his ordination and also from his first Mass at which Fr Timothy Radcliffe OP preached. More photos from these occasions may be seen here.

We are also happy to report that fr David Rocks OP, a member of the Irish Dominican Province and studying in Blackfriars Studium, Oxford, was ordained a deacon in Dublin on 5 January 2008. Br David continues his studies in Oxford and writes for Godzdogz.

Remembering fr Gordian Marshall OP

John Francis Marshall was born in Portobello, near Edinburgh, in 1938. He attended Holy Cross Academy in Edinburgh at the same time as Keith Patrick O’Brien, now Cardinal O’Brien. In Edinburgh he met the Scottish Dominican Fr Anthony Ross, and decided to enter the Order, taking the religious name of Gordian. After his studies in philosophy and theology he taught briefly at the Dominican preparatory school at Llanarth, in Monmouthshire. From there he went to Trinity and All Saints College, Leeds where he graduated B.Ed. He was assigned to the Dominican Conference Centre at Hawkesyard, in Staffordshire where he taught classes in scripture, Hebrew and religious studies, and organised conferences of the Council of Jews and Christians. He then worked in Leicester, as chaplain to the university. In 1990 he was assigned, as superior, to the Dominican house in Glasgow.

There he taught religious studies at St Andrew’s College, Bearsden, and later at the department of Religious Education at the University of Glasgow, from which he retired recently. In Scotland he served on the Churches’ Agency for Interfaith Relations, the Scottish Interfaith Council, Action of Churches Together in Scotland, and the Council of Religious Superiors in Scotland. He was in constant demand as a lecturer, preacher and retreat-giver.

For much of his life Father Gordian was involved with inter-faith dialogue, initially with the Council of Jews and Christians, and then with the Council of Christians, Jews and Muslims. Until recently he attended and lectured at the annual conference of Christians, Jews and Muslims at Benendorf in Germany; his knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures and the Koran enabled him to make important contributions to discussion and debate.

In 2005 the Dominican community moved to St Columba’s Parish, Woodside, Glasgow, and it was there that Father Gordian died suddenly on 14 December 2007. His funeral was on 21 December in St Columba's and both Cardinal O'Brien and Archbishop Mario Conti of Glasgow were present.

Gordian Marshall OP, RIP

The lead up to Christmas was overshadowed for us by the sudden death of our brother, Gordian Marshall OP, superior of the community in Glasgow. Please remember him in your prayers, as also all those who have died in recent days.

Christmas Concert at Blackfriars

Scenes from the Provincial Assembly 2007

From 17 - 19 December, the brothers of the English Dominican province gathered for an assembly, several months ahead of the provincial chapter, to discuss various reports pertaining to the life and mission of the province. The meeting was characterised by good humour and fraternal charity coupled with a zeal for preaching the Gospel and for our religious life. As we came together to pray, listen, reflect and discuss aspects of our life and work today, one could appreciate anew the words of the psalm: 'Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity' (133:1).

Below are some photos from the assembly:









Two brothers were instituted as lectors, and another two brothers as acolytes in the Mass on 19 December celebrated by the Provincial. These are instituted ministries in service of the Word and the Altar, respectively.

Finally, below are sights and sounds from Vespers including a video of the O antiphon 'O Radix' sung at Vespers on 19 December together with the Magnificat in Latin.







'O Root of Jesse, set up as a sign for the peoples, before whom kings will stop their mouths, to whom the nations will pray: come to set us free, delay no more.'

Salve procession

A provincial assembly is being held in Oxford from 17 -19 December, and we shall be bringing you photos and videos from this event, which is a rare opportunity for the English Dominicans to come together and enjoy our fraternal life as a province. Below is a live video recording of the 'Salve Regina' sung to Dominican chant after Vespers on the first day of the Assembly.

St. Rose of Lima

St. Rose of Lima was born Isabel de Flores on April 20, 1586 in the city of Lima, Peru. One day, her mother and some friends were sitting around the sleeping babe when a rose was seen to hover in the air above her head and descend to kiss her cheek. Her mother was astonished and in her joy promised never again to call her by any name but “Rose”.

When she was only six years old she began a life of mortification: fasting on bread and water alone on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. When she made her first communion and received Our Lord, Rose beheld him in a vision who told her that he would from that day forward sustain her body as well as her soul on the bread of life.

When she reached marriageable age her parents, Gaspar and Maria were terribly distraught when she turned down an offer from a wealthy man as they thought that this would be the answer to the financial problems they had had for many years. They turned on her, bullying her with words and even hitting her in their anger. However, once they realised that her mind was made up they allowed her to follow her conscience.

Rose was not content with commonplace virtue, she knew that to become a saint one must be a man or woman of penance, a victim on the altar of sacrifice. Her only food by this point was the roughest crusts of bread to which she added bitter herbs from her garden. As an imitation of Christ she also daily rinsed her mouth with the gall of a sheep and formed a crown of thorns from some pliable metal which she spiked at various points. When she wore this crown she would cover it with roses from her garden so as to disguise her penance.

Rose considered becoming a cloistered nun but was dissuaded by a heavenly voice which rendered her immovable when she tried to leave the Dominican church. She then realised that she was to be a tertiary and went on to receive the habit, which she wore at all times as was the custom for tertiaries then. Rose felt that she lacked apostolic labours and so convinced her family to allow her some rooms in the house to which she invited poor Native American women who often lived in terrible poverty and were still unconverted. Here she would tend to their spiritual as well as their physical needs

Before her death she experienced the dark night of the soul where she felt terrible despair and was beset by demonic forces. Through this, however, she was guided by Our Lord, Our Lady, St. Catherine and her guardian angel. Rose was miraculously granted knowledge of the time of her death, having been made aware that she would not live to see her 32nd year. Her last words were: “Jesus, Jesus, be with me.” After her death there were innumerable cures and a great change for the better throughout Latin America. In 1671 she was proclaimed a saint by Pope Clement IX and made special advocate of the Western hemisphere. She was the first saint of the Americas and is patroness of the whole of the Americas, as well as the Philippines.

In our time the life of St. Rose is particularly instructive. She was a lay woman who demonstrated how one can live in the world and do a great deal of apostolic work and yet still remain deeply contemplative. In this respect her life embodies the balance of the Dominican vocation to be a contemplative who ventures out to preach and to save souls. Her penance teaches us not to be attached to worldy things and her love for the Blessed Sacrament shows us that it is only by the strength we receive from Christ through his Church that we can do any good in this world.

Thanksgiving at Blackfriars

Godzdogz wishes all our American readers and friends a happy and blessed Thanksgiving!

fr Geoffrey Preston, O.P. (1936 - 1977)

Geoffrey Preston was was born in Winsford, Cheshire, where his grandmother lived, on 24 February 1936. He grew up in Beeston Castle where his father was the local blacksmith, as his grandfather had also been before him, and he was steeped in the Methodist tradition of his forebears. As Aidan Nichols OP, who was one of his novices, has written: "To this element in his upbringing belong his sense of the transcendence of God and his feeling for the local congregation as fully the church in its own place, as well as his love for the Bible and his extraordinary inwardness in getting beneath the skin of the scriptural text." He is also remembered for his love of Wesleyan hymns "though his rendering of them resembled a cow roaring"!

After attendance at the local grammar school and two years of national service with the Royal Air Force, he went up to read History at Durham University where he was active in various societies, a prize-winning debater, and "most improbably for a man of his physical proportions, the Tennis Club." Geoffrey was a voracious reader with "a delight in information on matters common and out-of-the-way alike" and his cell was crammed full of books on every conceivable subject, many "rescued" from second hand bookshops, and from his books he gleaned a collection of quotations which he used in his preaching and writing. It is said that "he never read without a pencil beside him, even in works of fiction". Eventually his treasury of books would became the nucleus of the Geoffrey Preston Library of the Catholic Chaplaincy at Leicester University, for he had been prior of Holy Cross, Leicester from 1976 until his premature death.

Nichols recounts how Geoffrey's encounter with Anglo-Catholicism confirmed his "horror of the demonstrative in religion though he saw good ritual as avoiding just such inauthentic over-statement". And so, Geoffrey converted to Catholicism via the Church of England in 1958. He spent a year teaching history in Blackpool before joining the Order where his desire "to get as deeply as possible into a living and articulate theological culture" was fed and in the Order his "zest for knowledge and a call to communicate to others" was fulfilled. He made profession on 28 September 1962 and was ordained priest on 15 July 1967.

Geoffrey lived as a religious in a time of great change for the Church and the question 'Where is God to be found?' would shape his response. According to Nichols, Geoffrey realised that "the clues to [God's] presence could only be uncovered in some rapport with the liturgical, spiritual and theological tradition which linked the church now with the time of Jesus and his disciples". Nevertheless, the process of finding God in a time when old certainties were called into question, and a traditional form of religious life was being re-evaluated, was one of interior suffering for Fr Geoffrey. From this suffering "issued a striking ministry of teaching and preaching and pastoral care. His gifts as a liturgist, a man of ritual, were out of the ordinary. He had a facility for combining the intimate with the solemn which made it thankfully impossible to claim him as either a progressive or a traditionalist" and this was a great gift indeed in a time of considerable polarisation. Thus, he was a pastor able to carry the burdens of God's people, whether they were impatient for change or distressed by it. These were certainly useful skills for someone who was appointed Master of Novices in 1970 and again in 1974 but he eventually resigned the position, though not without pain.

Fr Geoffrey's "theological and spiritual balance" which his novices appreciated seems to have had deep roots in a constant rumination of the Scriptures. According to one enclosed Carmelite, "one could feel that here was a man speaking of what he knew, and what he knew not 'through flesh and blood or through the will of man' but through the grace of the Father".

Preparing for a summer preaching tour of South Africa and on the eve of submitting a collection of writings to a publisher (edited posthumously for publication by Aidan Nichols OP), Geoffrey collapsed in Hawkesyard Priory, Staffordshire (where he is buried), and was diagnosed with gall-bladder problems but the surgeons could not operate immediately because of his size. As Nichols remembers, Geoffrey took communion to the sick "by bicycle... daily and perilously, for his girth had by now reached Falstaffian dimensions." He subsequently died, aged 41, of a heart attack with his brethren by his bedside; a death which might be regarded "not so much tragic as the plucking of ripened fruit."

How might we remember this "enormous, bovine, cheerful, inquisitive and childlike man"? Perhaps we can judge for ourselves from the three books which were published after his death. So many of his brethren and friends remember him with fondness and deep affection as a "generous and compassionate" pastor and Fr Nichols' biographical sketch exudes a certain devotion towards his former Novice Master. Indeed, the Province's obituary notices says that he was "foremost a preacher whose life and words he let be shaped by God and speak of God", a phrase used of our holy father Dominic himself. But the most memorable image we have is one offered by one of the brethren who remembers Geoffrey Preston as "that great mass of a man in a slightly grubby cream serge Dominican habit, occupying an armchair with the air of a beached whale, a rosary in his fingers and the Authorised Version of the Bible on his tummy."

May he thus repose eternally in the bosom of the Lord whom he loved and served so well.

fr Sebastian Bullough, O.P. (1910 - 1967)

Born in Cambridge on 17 May 1910 to parents who were both to become lay Dominicans, Fr Sebastian was baptised Halley Edward. His father, Edward Bullough, was a professor of German at Cambridge University and his mother, Enrichetta Marchetti was the only child of the Italian actress, Eleanora Duse.

To be precise about his baptism, Halley (undoubtedly named after the comet) had in fact first been baptised in Little St Mary's, an Anglican church in Cambridge. But when his mother rediscovered her Catholic faith, she took him to the Catholic church in Cambridge and had him conditionally baptised again and gave him the names Hugh Dominic!

Hugh Dominic subsequently received a Dominican education at the English Dominicans' schools at Hawkesyard and Laxton. His father had converted to Catholicism in 1923 and, together with his mother, were active in the promotion of the faith. Given this background and the active Catholic life led by his parents, "Halley Bullough stood little chance to escape." He joined the Order in 1931 and entered the Province's novitiate at Woodchester.

Meanwhile, his parents began to build a fine Italianate house in Cambridge (shown in the photo below) which was dedicated to St Michael, but sadly, Professor Bullough's unexpected death from septicaemia in 1937 meant that he never saw the completion of his house, nor did Mrs Bullough inhabit it for long. In 1938, upon completion of the house, she bequeathed it to the English Dominican friars. This outstanding generosity crowned the gift of her two children to the Order, for Br Sebastian - as he was now called in the Order - had been joined by his sister Leonora who became Sr Mary Mark of the English Dominican Sisters at Stone.

Fr Sebastian was ordained on 22 July 1937 and assigned to the new priory of Cambridge where he could care for his mother who lived close by the house. He began his studies in Hebrew and Aramaic at the university rather than in Jerusalem, as was initially intended and after two years of further study in Rome, he was sent to teach at Laxton. He also served as prior at Woodchester, and taught in Blackfriars Oxford and finally from 1960, at the Cambridge faculty of Oriental Languages. Thus he returned to his roots where his mother died in 1961.

Fr Sebastian was a noted Biblical scholar who had a "passion to integrate Scripture as completely as possible with the Catholic organism", such that references in Scripture could give rise to footnotes on Roman basilicas or articles in the Penny Catechism and his Advent meditations frequently connected Scriptural texts with a rumination on plainsong melodies. His concern for Scripture as the inspiration for all things Catholic anticipated in many ways the Vatican II document 'Dei Verbum'. He was a member of the committee of the Society for Old Testament Studies and chairman of the Catholic Biblical Association. He was also vice-president of the Latin Mass Society, and the changes in the Church's liturgy in the wake of Vatican II saddened him.

He died on 30 July 1967 at the Dominican sisters' convent in Stone and was buried at Cambridge according to the Dominican rite so beloved by him. His Requiem was celebrated by the bishop of Nottingham according to the "full Latin liturgy of the Mass".

In his last book, 'Roman Catholicism', written in 1963, Fr Sebastian said that Dominicans "were to combine the secluded monastic life of the monk, including the Divine Office in choir, with the priestly work of the canon regular and the independent poverty of the itinerant preacher, free to be assigned anywhere in the Order." His understanding of our life remains true today, but in 1967 - the year of his death - he made an observation about the importance of contemplative prayer and choral office in the authentic Dominican life: "[St Dominic] founded a monastic Order whose members are, so to speak, 'preaching monks', from which it follows that monastic life is of the essence of the Order." In many ways, his spirit and ideals live on in our Cambridge priory, the house which owes its existence to the generosity of the Bulloughs.

Forty years after his death, Fr Sebastian's words continue to remind us that Dominican should be preachers of a word that has been prayerfully contemplated in humility, in silence and in assiduous study. Or as the Preaching Commission to the General Chapter at Krakow said in 2004: "In this world we will have something to say, but only if it is a word for which we have suffered, a word we have fought for, and a word for which we have prayed."

In remembering his 40th anniversary, we recall his wisdom, we ponder the fruit of his contemplation, and we give thanks for his example.

November Days

Nature parades the last of her autumn splendour but will soon be completely stripped for the winter months ahead. It is a dead time, the fag-end of the year, short evenings and cold mornings, days neither wet nor dry, the sun trying to break through. ‘The end is nigh’, we might be tempted to cry, as nature retreats underground.

This dead month of November is the month of the dead. Remembrance Sunday comes with its quiet solemnity, its sad memories of young lives cut short, the tragic waste of human life that the last century saw (and that, sadly, continues). At Mass all this month we remember the dead, all those we have loved, young and old. Some died in the fullness of their years, others before their lives were fully underway. We remember all who have gone before us, parents, children and friends whom we continue to mourn and whom we continue to miss.

On the banks of the river Boyne in county Meath stands a structure older than the pyramids. The passage grave or tumulus at Newgrange was constructed some five thousand years ago. Its builders seem to have been preoccupied with winter and with death. Above the entrance to the passage there is a small opening through which the sun shines on the morning of 21 December, its rays penetrating some fifty feet to the inner chamber where the ashes of the dead were kept. It is an extraordinary construction that required painstaking and precise work and nobody knows for sure what it means.

At Newgrange the mid-winter sun reached — and still reaches — deep within the earth to illuminate the place of the dead. Because of this some think it is a very ancient expression of hope in an after life. In the moment when the northern hemisphere is at its lowest point these primitive but sophisticated people looked, it seems, to the return of the sun, to a light illuminating the winter darkness, to some way in which the life-giving rays of the sun might reach the place of the dead.

We stand on firmer ground when we read the Book of Daniel, written a century and a half before the birth of Christ. It contains the first clear enunciation in the Bible of belief in the resurrection of the dead. ‘Those who lie sleeping will awake’, it says, the just to receive the reward of ‘everlasting life’ (Daniel 12.2). It is also the first time that the phrase ‘everlasting life’ occurs in the Bible. Those who have taught others goodness and virtue will ‘shine like stars for all eternity’. This is quite a change from the grey and mouldy Hades of which the earlier Hebrews spoke, a place of ghosts, neither alive nor dead, an in-between place not reached by God’s light and from which God is not praised.

The firmest ground of all is the Christian hope in the resurrection of the dead founded on the resurrection of Jesus Christ. In one of the earliest New Testament texts to witness to this hope Saint Paul says ‘we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and that it will be the same for those who have died in Jesus: God will bring them with him’ (1 Thessalonians 4.14).

There is an end time to which we look forward which will not be a November end, nor a winter time of mourning and tears. Even in these dog days of the year’s decline we look forward to an eternal spring in which all that has been sown in tears will be reaped in joy. Much has been wasted, much has been left unfinished, much has already been surrendered to death. But nothing is lost because Jesus Christ ‘has offered one single sacrifice for sins and then taken his place forever at the right hand of God’ (Hebrews 10.12). When the Son of Man comes in power and glory he will send out his angels ‘to gather his chosen from the four winds’ (Mark 13.26-17).

For the present we wait as we protect ourselves from the wintry chill. In many churches a ‘Book of the Dead’ is placed on the altar and left there throughout November. We hope that all whose names are entered in such books — together with all our deceased relatives and friends — also have their names inscribed in the Lord’s ‘book of life’ (Daniel 12.1). We pray that their good deeds have gone with them and that when winter has passed they will shine like stars for ever and ever (Daniel 12.3).

A Dominican Vocation

Whilst I have always been a Catholic, for most of my life I had great difficulty in seeing myself as the sort of person who could become a priest. I decided my true calling was to be a mathematician, so I duly went off to Cambridge to study mathematics.

It was whilst finishing my PhD in Cambridge that I spent 9 months living in the Dominican lay community. The lay community consisted of about six lay students living alongside six Dominican friars and sharing in their prayer life. I really enjoyed life there, and the thought did occur to me that maybe I could become a Dominican. But I hesitated. There were so many other things I wanted to do. Religious life would be fine if only I could pick and choose the bits I liked and reject the bits I didn’t. So instead I got a job as a software engineer in Somerset. Maybe there I could settle down, buy a house and have a family.

Two years into my job, I was listening to the radio and a journalist was saying that there was a crisis in religious vocations. I wondered whether there really was a crisis. Maybe there was only if people like myself didn’t respond to God’s call. Maybe God was calling me but I just wasn’t listening. So over the next few days I listened. It was only then I really started to understand how much God loved me and how much I loved God. I didn’t need to get married to be a complete person. My faith in Jesus Christ made me a complete person. For the first time in my life, becoming a priest was something I really wanted to do.

At this stage I didn’t know what sort of priest I should become, so I got in touch with Worth Abbey which runs a religious discernment programme. Over the next year, I went to Worth Abbey once a month. This really helped me discover how I could best serve God, and I soon started to look at the Dominicans. It wasn’t just that I enjoyed living with Dominicans, but I really believed in their mission statement – preaching for the salvation of souls. Being a fairly shy person, the thought of being in the Order of Preachers was fairly daunting, but I felt I didn’t have to rely on my own strength – God would give me the strength to do His will.

So here I am, in the Order of Preachers, confident that God will give me the grace to live out my Dominican vocation.

Br. Robert Verrill is a first year student

Not fanaticism but radical love

"Peter began to say to him, "Lo, we have left everything and followed you." Jesus said, "Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life." - Mark 10:28-30

Fr Peter Hunter OP preached at Mass for the feast of All Saints of the Dominican order (7 November) and the Gospel appointed for the feast is that given above. The homily inspired his hearers and we hope that it will give Godzdogz readers an appreciation of our life and hopes.

Fr Bob Ombres once told me a story of travelling in his native Naples. He was talking to a man who told him he was a Catholic. Fr Ombres expressed interest and asked the man where he went to church. Puzzled, the man replied, “Cattolico, non fanatico!”

Yet, religious life can seem in today’s world like fanaticism, a wide-eyed pursuit of an ideal, giving up all sorts of important things in this pursuit. Jesus, in the Gospel appointed for today’s feast (Mark 10:28-30) talks about leaving family and property for his sake and for the Gospel. Isn’t that rather fanatical?

The same Fr Ombres said to me when he heard that I had made the decision to make final vows in the Order, “I’m so glad! If you really throw yourself into it, the life will make you very happy.” But can this kind of wide-eyed pursuit, this kind of fanaticism, make you happy?

The feast we celebrate today, the feast of All Saints of the Order of Preachers, is our more parochial version of the universal Church’s celebration of All Saints. That it makes sense to celebrate it at all is confirmation that the Dominican way of life is rich enough and wide enough to be a way of holiness. That is to say, it says that after all, the Dominican way of life is a way to be happy.

What is this way of life? Our Order is dedicated to the study and preaching of the truth of the Gospel. And when we characterise it like that, we see that commitment to this life cannot be fanatical. It cannot be fanatical because it is, we now see, not a wide-eyed pursuit of an ideal, but based on the love of a person. Loving the truth of the Gospel is ultimately nothing other than loving Jesus. The Dominican saints, no less than the apostles, leave family and property not for an ideal, but out of love for the Son of God. This means that this following, while radical, is not fanatical but reasonable and human.

An early Dominican expressed a worry (perhaps a tongue-in-cheek one) that the life gave him so much joy and hence could not be a way to heaven for him. But it was for him, and it is for us, if we give ourselves to it freely and fully. We can celebrate today that our way of life turns out to be rich enough, broad enough, to be a way to heaven and rededicate ourselves to living that life properly. In doing that, we leave behind things which we rightly love, not out of a wide-eyed fanaticism, but because we love Christ more.

Remember, remember...

On 2 November, the Master of Ceremonies at Blackfriars, Oxford puts up a notice saying: "Remember, remember the second of November". This, of course, is an allusion to the chant sung by English children in the run up to Guy Fawkes' day which falls on the fifth of November. But what are we friars asked to remember on the 2 November?

We are reminded to don the black cappa of the Order for Mass and the major offices:


November is a month for remembering, for calling to mind those holy souls who rejoice in heaven (All Saints' Day) and those who undergo purgation (All Souls' Day). In addition to these feasts of the universal Church, Dominicans also celebrate their own feasts, All Saints of the Order of Preachers on 7 November and Commemoration of our Deceased Brothers and Sisters on 8 November.


As this is a month for remembering the dead, Godzdogz will be recalling the lives of deceased English Dominicans. Watch this space.

"Time to take a different path"

Recently, on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the Abortion Act, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor and Cardinal Keith O'Brien wrote an open letter on behalf of the bishops of England, Wales and Scotland. They said:

"The Catholic faith lets us see the radiant glory of human life from its beginning to its end. When we know that every person whatever their age, race or condition carries the image of God, we see their infinite value and dignity. Whether we have this vision of faith or not, cherishing life is the central value of every society that wants to flourish.

The Catholic Church offers to participate with others in working for this timely change of heart and mind. We hope and pray for the sake of our common humanity, and the lives at stake, that the next 40 years will tell a very different story. The time to take a different path is now."

On Saturday 27 October, the Oxford University Pro-life Society organized a peaceful act of witness on Oxford's busiest shopping street to raise awareness about the tragedy of abortion in our society and to encourage people to re-examine the issues. They were joined by six Dominican students. Below are some photos from this occasion:

Dominican Study Week in Dubrovnik

At the beginning of September three Dominican students from Blackfriars, Oxford travelled to the Croatian city of Dubrovnik to take part in the tenth Dominican Study Week. The theme this year was 'Dominican Spirituality in the modern world', and during the course of the week talks were given on topics relating to the way in which Dominicans live out their Christian vocation today. The Study Week is an important opportunity for Dominican students from different European countries to come together and share their experiences. This year students from England, Croatia, Poland and Spain took part.



To reflect the international character of the Study Week, we sang the Divine Office and the Mass in Latin each day, although the talks were given in English, Italian and Croatian, with a simultaneous translation service.

During the week we were guests of the community of friars at the beautiful 14th-century Dominican priory which clings to the walls of the old city. With its rich religious and cultural history, Dubrovnik is a true gem of a city nestled on the Adriatic coast in the extreme south of Croatia; the Dominican priory is just minutes from the beach and enjoys fantastic views of the sea. Although the city suffered heavy damage during the Balkan conflict some sixteen years ago today the city has been fully restored to its original splendour and tourists throng to the city. Bernard Shaw was surely right when he wrote that “those who seek paradise on earth should come to Dubrovnik and see Dubrovnik”.

On one day during the visit we were all taken on an excursion to three of the nearby islands of the coast of Croatia. We sailed on a replica of a sixteenth century ship. Although we fought bravely to fight off an unseasonably cold wind, wrapping ourselves in blankets, we were cheered on board by a hearty fish lunch with wine to the accompaniment of the accordion and Croatian folk songs.


The day before we returned home we were able to attend the ordination to the priesthood of our Dominican brother Mihael Mario Tolj in the Cathedral of Saint Mark on the island of Korčula some sixty miles from Dubrovnik. The ordination was followed by a substantial meal for about a hundred people hosted by the thriving community of Dominican sisters whose motherhouse is on the island. There was much laughter and singing at this celebration and it was a chance to experience what we had reflected on during the week - the joy of Dominican life.

We had much opportunity during this Study Week to reflect with other friars on the way the Dominican charism is lived in our respective countries, and we came away from Croatia with a deeper appreciation of the fraternal bonds that we share in St Dominic, love for our common mission, and gratitude for the hospitality we received from our Croatian brothers and sisters.

Simple Profession 2007

On 22 September, after the clothing of the new novices (see post below), two brothers finishing the novitiate in Cambridge made simple profession in the Order. Please remember them in your prayers. (They will of course be joining the 'Godzdogz' team in Oxford, so please welcome Br Robert Verrill OP and Br Daniel Mary Jeffries OP.)

Below are some photos from the Simple Profession Mass, which was followed by a reception in the priory:

The novices make the form of a Cross, as a sign of the total gift of themselves to the service of the God and His Church in the footsteps of St Dominic.

Br Robert makes Profession.

Br Daniel Mary makes Profession.

The Prior Provincial blesses the scapulars of the newly-professed.

Br Robert & Br Daniel were joined by family and friends.

So there are now three novices at Cambridge and there will be fourteen students at Oxford this academic year, from four provinces (England, Belgium, Ireland and the province of St Martin de Porres in the Southern USA). Please pray that our kindest Lord, in whose hand are all good things, may increase our love and our peace as we seek to become ever more completely the loving servants of his Word.

Clothing of novices in Cambridge

On Saturday 22 September, the English Province welcomed three new novices, who were clothed in the habit of the Order in a private ceremony in Blackfriars, Cambridge.

The postulants, before the ceremony, sitting behind their new habits.

Making the form of a Cross, the postulants implore God's mercy and that of the brethren.

The Prior Provincial then preaches a sermon addressed to the postulants, but also for the benefit of all the brothers witnessing the ceremony.

"Put off the old man that belongs to your former manner of life..." (Ephesians 4:22)
The removal of secular clothing (jacket and tie) is symbolic of one's removal from secular life.

"And put on the new man, created after the likeness of God in true