Three-Fold Celebration: Centennial Jubilee, Corpus Christi and Mass of Thanksgiving!

The best things come in threes, and beginning May 29th, we began the month of June with three joyous celebrations: the 100th anniversary of the founding of our Monastery, Corpus Christi Sunday, and a Mass of Thanksgiving with one of our newly ordained friars.

This year marks the Centennial Anniversary of the foundation of our monastery. Due to COVID restrictions, we planned two celebrations to open our Jubilee year, as attendance needed to be monitored by issuing tickets to the Masses and receptions. This first celebration was held Saturday, May 29th, and included our Dominican family. Father Christopher Fadok, O.P., prior provincial of the Western Dominican Province, was our celebrant and homilist, and he was joined around the altar by many of our friars. After celebrating Mass, we all enjoyed a box lunch generously donated by the Western Dominican Province and our first in-person visit with our Dominican brothers and sisters in over a year!

Very Rev. Christopher Fadok, O.P., prior provincial of the Western Dominican Province. Photo by Br. David Woo, O.P., courtesy of the Western Dominican Province.

Rev. Br. Chrysostom Mijinke, O.P. proclaiming the Gospel. Photo by Br. David Woo, O.P., courtesy of the Western Dominican Province.

Outdoor reception, the meal was a gift from the Western Dominican Province in celebration of our Jubilee. And the personalized labels on each item was a delightful surprise! Photo by Br. David Woo, O.P., courtesy of the Western Dominican Province.

It was so good to visit with our Dominican family, even with the masks (can you speak up…and who are you? :-) Photo by Br. David Woo, O.P., courtesy of the Western Dominican Province.

Our Centennial Anniversary celebrations continued the following weekend as we celebrated Corpus Christi Sunday with our family, friends and benefactors. Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco was our celebrant and homilist. This celebration occurred on the liturgical anniversary of our foundation (liturgically, our monastery was founded on the Sunday within the Octave of Corpus Christi - Corpus Christi would have been celebrated on the previous Thursday). Again, we were overcome with gratitude for all the graces and blessings God has given us, and continued to shower down with the presence, kindness and support of so many that day, especially our Archbishop and the priests, deacons, and seminarians who were present. At the end of Mass, as we finished the recessional hymn, we looked up in the choir to see Archbishop Cordileone walk in with Sister Maria Christine, a delightful surprise! He wanted to make sure he was able to greet us personally and gave us his blessing. Following Mass, we enjoyed a leisurely reception.

To round out our celebrations, friar Chysostom Mijinke, O.P. of the Western Dominican Province, who served as deacon for our Jubilee Mass on May 29th, returned to our monastery on June 8th as Father Chrysostom to celebrate a Mass of Thanksgiving and give us first blessings. This day is particularly special to Dominican nuns as it is the feast of Blesseds Cecilia and Diana, two of the earliest nuns of our Order, and who were particularly dear to our Holy Father Dominic and Blessed Jordan of Saxony, the second Master of our Order. After Mass, we had a good visit with Father Chrysostom before he headed off to a busy summer and his new assignment as a Dominican priest.

Father Chrysostom Mijinke, O.P., newly ordained priest of the Western Dominican Province, giving first blessings to our community after Mass.

The past year has brought us many challenges and in many ways, life has a “new normal” due to COVID. Yet the most essential things remain - love, communion, and the reason for our hope. Be sure to check our website for updates as we continue to gradually expand our public chapel hours and post Centennial Jubilee updates and events. And a big thank you to our Dominican family, our Archbishop and the Local Church, and all our friends, family, and benefactors who continue to support our contemplative life. Please know you remain in our hearts and prayers before our Eucharistic Lord.

One Hour That Can Change Everything

This past Sunday we celebrated our monastic community’s feast day: Corpus Christi Sunday. And while it was an unprecedented celebration due to COVID-19 – no friends and family and Dominican brothers and sisters filling our chapel for Mass and Benediction, no reception after – one thing, the most important thing, did not change in the day’s liturgy and our keeping of holy hours – the remembrance and adoration of Jesus in the Eucharist.

One of our monastery’s practices that we inherited from one of our “grandmother” monasteries in France was a devotion to our Eucharistic Lord. The practice of perpetual adoration was first introduced to a Dominican monastery at Oullins, France, and every monastery that can trace its roots to Oullins inherited the privilege and practice of perpetual adoration, including the first Dominican monastery founded in the United States. Our monastery is also part of this line of perpetual adoration monasteries and it is one of the reasons why we were asked to found in San Francisco – to bring perpetual adoration to the Bay Area. How beautiful it is to see perpetual adoration chapels and holy hour devotions in so many parishes and kept by so many people in our area and beyond!

In his autobiography, Treasure in Clay, Venerable Fulton Sheen outlines some of the reasons why he began the practice of keeping a daily holy hour and why he encouraged everyone to make the same commitment.

1. The practice of keeping a holy hour is actually not a devotion – it is a sharing in the work of redemption. On the night Jesus experienced His agony in the garden, the night he was to be betrayed by one of his own and arrested and convicted to death, the night evil seemed to be let loose and it looked like it might win after all, Jesus asked his disciples to wait and pray with him. He was asking for an hour of redemption to combat the hour of evil in the world.

2. The night of his agony was the only time Jesus asked anything of his disciples, and he did not ask for activity – he asked for companionship. In particular, he singled out his three closest disciples, Peter James and John, to be particularly vigilant with him, as he was “sorrowful unto death”. He also advised them it was to their benefit that they keep watch and pray because he didn’t want his disciples to be caught off-guard, which they were as they gave into sleep. The same holds true for us – when we allow ourselves to spiritually slumber, we too are caught off-guard by temptation and evil.

3. The third reason Archbishop Sheen gives for keeping a holy hour is so that we may be made more and more into the likeness of Jesus.

“Looking at the Eucharistic Lord for an hour transforms the heart in a mysterious way as the face of Moses was transformed after his companionship with God on the mountain. Something happens to us similar to that which happened to the disciples at Emmaus. On Easter Sunday afternoon when the Lord met them, He asked why they were so gloomy. After spending some time in His presence, and hearing again the secret of spirituality – ‘the Son of Man must suffer to enter into His Glory’ – their time with Him ended, and their ‘hearts were on fire.’”

To be sure, keeping a daily or even weekly holy hour is not always easy. Sacrifices of time and energy must be made. Archbishop Sheen describes a few of his experiences – missing social engagements in order to keep his Holy Hour commitment, having to rise extra-early to spend a holy hour before a day of travel, getting locked in churches at night because the pastor forgot to let him out at the end of the hour, falling asleep during a holy hour because he was so tired, and hours spent in dry, distracted prayer. We can relate to many of these.

Nonetheless, “the purpose of the Holy Hour is to encourage deep personal encounter with Christ” and he considered his holy hour the “hour that makes the day”. Jesus is always there in the Eucharist, waiting for us. To gaze upon Him is to be reminded of how much He loves us NOW. Not just at Calvary – He comes to us today in the Eucharist. And He desires to transform us, to set us free. But He cannot do this unless we do our part and welcome the encounter.

But what if we can’t make it to a church or chapel for a holy hour with our Eucharistic Lord? In the days of COVID-19, access to churches and the Blessed Sacrament has been rare or simply not possible for most of us. Should we just forget the idea of keeping a holy hour with Jesus? Archbishop Sheen has a suggestion for that as well.

In speaking to Protestant pastors, he encouraged them to also keep a continuous Holy Hour of prayer to combat the forces of evil in the world:

“You are not blessed with the same Divine Presence in your churches that I believe we possess. But you do have another presence that we do also, and that is the Scripture. At the [Second] Vatican Council we had a solemn procession of the Scriptures into the Council every morning as a form of the Presence of God. You could make the Hour before the Scripture.”

So, if you are unable to keep a Holy Hour before the Blessed Sacrament, keep one with the Holy Scriptures, which is truly a form of Christ’s presence. We need these hours of prayer to combat the evil in our world, to allow Jesus to transform us and make us truly free. And Jesus thirsts for our companionship. One hour, that’s all it takes. The length of time of a primetime drama. But it can change the course of history – how shall we spend this hour?

Celebrating Corpus Christi Sunday

On Corpus Christi Sunday, Dominican family, friends, and benefactors gathered at the monastery to celebrate with us our patronal feast day. The festivities began with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. The principal celebrant and homilist was Father Andrew Opsahl, O.P. Father Andy is one of the newly ordained priests for the Western Dominican Province. He was joined at the altar by many of our Dominican friars, including Bishop Robert Christian, O.P., auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of San Francisco, and Father Stephen Maria Lopez, O.P., student master for the Western Dominican Province.

Immediately following Mass was a Eucharistic Procession and Benediction. After the beautiful and solemn celebration of the Eucharist, a reception was held in the parlor for everyone. It was a delight and joy to share this special day with all our dear ones. And it is a day that will be particularly poignant in our hearts and minds with the sudden passing of Bishop Robert Christian.

Thank you to everyone who joined us in celebrating and giving thanks for the life, love, and many graces God has poured out on us.