Since Jesus told the beloved apostle, “Behold your mother,” at the cross, Christians have gone to Mary, as she is our mother in the order of grace. But Dominicans have a special devotion to Our Lady as she is our Patroness and was instrumental in bringing our Order into existence, sustaining it and causing it to flourish.
Read MoreThis is the advice given by many saints, and Dominicans are no exception.
Read MoreMost people are familiar with the afternoon and evening liturgies of the Triduum: Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Holy Thursday, the Liturgy of the Lord’s Passion on Good Friday, and, of course, the Easter Vigil Mass the night before Easter Sunday. But there is also another powerful time of liturgical prayer during the early morning of these three days: Tenebrae.
Read MoreWe’d been praying for good weather - all week, we’d been blessed with steady rain, but on this day, we hoped for sun! As Mass ended at 9 a.m. on Saturday, March 9th, the rain returned. But that didn’t stop about 20 Stanford University students from gathering outside our gate for a morning of grounds work!
Read MoreGod forms an alliance with us through Mary. Yet we must understand, that which is done for us cannot save us without our own consent. God waits for us, for our humble concurrence to His plan for our lives.
Read MoreYou’ve learned your betrothed is pregnant, and you’re not the father. Human? Divine? What do you do? Then, God speaks to you in a dream. Take her as your wife. Raise the son she carries. You wake with peace and resolve and immediately obey what God has asked of you. To the rest of the world, it sounds crazy…
Read MoreIt goes without saying that by living a cloistered life, we have made the choice to forego going outside our monastery walls, even for good causes, such as a liturgical or devotional event within the local Church. Because of the graces and blessings of this life, we are usually not too troubled by this fact. But our community is especially blessed to have a local Church that is mindful of our cloister and “goes the extra mile.”
Read MoreOur passions, or our emotions, are truly powerful - they can move us, or drag us down, like nothing else! But can we harness our passion power for good and not evil?
Read MoreA Christian mystic is gifted by God with a state of soul raised to higher forms of prayer – to extraordinary heights of contemplation. St. Catherine de Ricci was a true mystic. God graced her with extraordinary favors in her prayer life, so much so that one might think she was too inapproachable in her daily life, yet this was not the case.
Read MoreHis mother was appalled by her young son’s choice of life vocation - he had the world at his fingertips and he would throw it away to be a poor friar?! His brothers scoffed, kidnapped him, and locked him in a tower of the family castle until he changed his mind. His sisters begged and cajoled, but the young man converted them to his way of thinking. Then his brothers decided to try a different approach. He was a young, vigorous man, after all. So they sent into his room a beautiful woman of ill repute to seduce him.
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