Reflection for the Feast of St. Dominic

Last year I celebrated this day in Fanjeaux and Prouille, as most of you know these were the places in Southern France where Dominic decided to found the Order. One of the things you learn in these places is why contemplation was the centerpiece of the charism he bequeathed to us. You realize why contemplation informs and shapes the preaching mission. You see it's the walking that you remember; walking the dusty road to Prouille; climbing the hills to Carcassone; and ambling through the valleys to Toulouse. Dominic found God in the walking.

When you walk you move slowly, deliberately. Augustine said," Solvitur ambulando. (It is solved by walking)." Being on the dusty roads Dominic found how to walk interiorly. He journeyed by foot and by soul. He solved his dilemmas while walking. We must remember Dominic spent ten unsuccessful years in Fanjeaux; unsuccessful if you measure success by converts. But if you measure success by the development of the interior life then these were very successful years.

For it was at the end of these ten years that he stood looking at the valley below from the point in Fanjeaux now called Le Signadou. It was here he received the sign. It was here he decided that his call was to found an order of itinerant preachers. It was on this high point that he realized that the small band of women living in Prouille would be an integral part of the founding off this band of preachers, preachers who would continue the walking, continue the talking with and of God.

And so we the inheritors of that call must also be on the road. We must always be on the road if only in our hearts. Many of us don't walk many places any more. If we do we complain or we do it for exercise. But walking in the sacred journey does not involve only the physical action of walking. It more requires the soul decision to keep on the journey. When I walked in the footsteps of Dominic I realized how difficult both the physical and soul walking really are. These roads are dusty, hot, uneven, tedious and often very steep. You get winded, thirsty and tired. You stop. You have to decide to get going again. The journey of the soul is the same. Our soul journey is the same. It is never ending, always beginning.

Dominic found God in the now, in each moment of the walk. That is the contemplative stance. God speaks in each moment if we are attentive as we walk, and as we live each moment every day. However many of us are like my nephew. Kevin is five and he is always on the go. So he always wants to know what is next. The problem is that when he gets to the next thing he hardly notices, rather he is wondering about what will be next. We slow him down to help him to notice the now, to savor the experience of the present. All of us have a little of Kevin in us. We might be rushing onto the next activity or perhaps wishing that the present experience was better or different. We might want better health or less stress or, or. You can name your own wishes, your own ways to escape what is your now.

However, Dominic shows us to focus on the now we are really experiencing. For it is there that God waits. T.S. Eliot said," We must be still, and still moving. Into a deeper intensity…" We must be on the road whatever that road is like - whether it is a road of active ministry or the road of physical diminishment or roads in between. We must be in the now, listening to God. But we don't travel this road alone. As Dominicans we travel in the company of our sisters. We are a company of preachers on the road together, perhaps at different points on the road, but together.

And as a company of preachers we have to learn from Dominic about how to travel. He was known to be the joyful friar, an approachable person. He always saw the truth of the other person even if he disagreed. He listened, questioned, dialoged but never belittled. He engaged. He accepted. That was what made his preaching different.

Can it make ours different again? What road are you traveling? Who are your companions? Are you accepting your journey? Be still. Discover God in the moment. Listen to the voice of God not your own. Seek God on the road and you will find you are living deeply our charism. People will notice the preaching of your life, your contemplative stance. They will find joyful preachers, gospel women of prayer, they will find Dominican women of hope on the road.

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