St. Dominic

There are, it is said, two kinds of saints, those to whom our gaze is directed and those who direct our gaze elsewhere. Dominic belonged to the latter. His personality, attractive and warm, and much evident during his lifetime, remains an outstanding feature in any account of his life. It is not, however, his personality that is best remembered, and which has had a lasting influence on the Church, but his ideas, his undertakings and his mission.

St. Dominic was the shy type; he preferred to resign from leading the Order once it was set up, and wanted always to be treated as “one of the brethren”. On his deathbed he expressed his wish to be buried at the feet of his brothers. He knew that being a genuine preacher did not mean drawing attention to one’s own qualities, but rather, knowing how to disappear behind the message. Perhaps he had learnt from John the Baptist: “I must grow lesser so that He can grow greater.”

Dominic was born in a typical Castilian town in medieval Spain. Some Castilian towns had castles, from which we derive the name of the region, and so did little Dominic’s family. Nevertheless, his aristocratic descent did not spare him from daily chores. Early on, he showed an interest for consecrated life, and later became a Canon (a sort of monk in the cathedral).

Now, just like in the fairy tales, there was once a prince, and a princess. A Spanish prince wanted to marry a Danish princess. Bishop Diego was to pay her a visit to convince her of the convenience of the marriage. Diego took with him Dominic. Perhaps he sensed that she would be difficult to persuade, though one cannot know for sure, since history remains understandably silent on the subject.

On their way there, Dominic discovered that the owner of the inn they were staying at in Toulouse was an Albigensian. Albigensians belonged to a kind of Manichean sect known as Cathars — they were people who had abandoned the Church thinking that they could be more faithful to the Gospel outside the Church. They thought that every material thing was evil and that only spiritual things were good.

Dominic spent the whole night talking to this innkeeper until he was persuaded to join the Church again. As Dominic travelled deep into Europe he realised how serious the problem of the heresies was. Diego and Dominic returned home after their mission in Denmark had been accomplished. As soon as they had arrived they were again dispatched to fetch the princess for the marriage. However, the princess had by this time decided to become a nun. Historians leave us in the dark as to her reasons, and we shall not be the ones to cast stones at a Spanish prince. In any case, the political problem was now also a religious matter, and it was most likely that Diego was sent to Rome to discuss the issue with the Pope.

All the while, though, Diego was troubled by the problem of the heretics and the unconverted. As a result, he asked the Pope for permission to resign his see in order to devote himself to preaching to the Tartars. The Pope refused the request and Diego complied.

On his way back to Spain, Diego met three papal envoys sent to combat the heresy in France. They were immensely disappointed at their lack of success. Apparently the bad example of the clergy was working better than their preaching. Diego and Dominic realised that there was something wrong with the way they presented themselves when preaching. These papal envoys surrounded themselves with all the privileges and luxuries of Imperial envoys, while the heretics stressed living the gospel in poverty since riches were a work of the devil.

Dominic proposed fighting fire with fire. Rather than riding on horses, he started to preach not only on foot, but barefooted and living on alms. Preaching in poverty proved to work. Dominic also participated in apologetic debates, with similar success. The situation became tense, and soon there were heretics threatening and killing the Church’s preachers. The Pope’s reaction was to call for a crusade.

Unfortunately, this only served to widen the gulf and left behind a long task of reconciliation. Dominic had another approach to the problem. One day, the heretics planned an ambush to kill Dominic himself. He came to know about it, and as he was approaching the ambush site he started to sing, and his killers were disarmed at the sight of his courage.

One has to be in love with one’s faith to be contagious. This was Dominic’s main conviction and he soon planned a team of preachers for the pursuit of his strategy. This was to become the Dominican Order.

St. Dominic had a personality to match his endeavour. He was not an aggressive apologetic, he was a compassionate preacher. Proposing was more effective than imposing, because the Gospel has to be accepted in total freedom. He also wanted his friars to enjoy this same kind of freedom. His compassion had driven him to sell his precious incunabula (extremely valuable manuscripts) to palliate the sufferings caused by a terrible famine in his Canon days, and after he had become a penniless begging-friar, he decided on two occasions to sell himself to pay the ransom of people kidnapped by the Moors.

His companions declared of him, “I never knew anyone whose service of God I liked so much. And he was more zealous for the salvation of souls than any man I ever saw.”

Blessed Jordan of Saxony, Dominic’s successor as Master of the Order, comments on Dominic’s character: “Because a happy heart makes for a happy face, his inner peacefulness was betrayed outwardly by his obvious kindness and by his cheerful expression.”

Dominic died peacefully in 1221 and was buried, as he humbly wished, at the feet of his brethren, but the history of his Order continues…