Signs of the Times  

  St. Dominic  -- Feastday August 8th  -- Canonized July 13, 1234

   PATRON SAINT of: 
   Astronomers, astronomy, falsely accused people, scientists


    Dominic was born at Calaroga in Old Castile in 1170 and was the founder of the Dominican Order of friar-preachers.  Before Dominic's time the ruling principle had been separation from the world, in order to join Christ.  Dominic and later Francis, too, advocated saving the world, not by renouncing it, but by mingling and engaging with it.

     Dominic was educated at the University of Palencia, where he spent some twelve years in theological study.  He is said to have sold his clothes and books to give money to the poor.  On one occasion, he was allegedly prepared to offer himself in slavery, in order to release a man who had been captured by the Moors.

     At the age of 25, he became Canon of Osma, his native diocese, where he became famous for the extreme length of his prayers.  He spent whole nights in church in prayer.  The year between 1195 and 1205 are full of fabulous stories about missions to the Moors, but in fact, Dominic stayed at Osma, frequently preaching in the cathedral.  It was on his visit to Languedoc in southern France in 1206 that he had the idea of founding his new order.  He was sent there specifically by Pope Innocent III to preach among the Albigensian heretics, which he did for ten years.  He became aware early on that it was mainly weapons and persecution that were used aginst the heretics, and that few attempts other than his own were being made to teach and convert them.  He was sickened by the massacre of the heretics in the years folowing 1208, when the papal legate was murdered.
    
       Dominic established the Rosary as a method of giving clear and simple teaching and to provide simple, spiritual exercises for people who were unable to read prayerbooks.
       In 1215, he won permission from Innocent III to set up his new order.  His preachers were to be independent of bishops, though Innocent hesitated about this.  The Dominican order was largely successful and spread rapidly.  In five years there were Dominican converts in Italy, Spain, France, Germany and Poland, comprising over 500 friars and 60 friaries.

     In 1221, he fell ill at Venice.  He had planned to preach to the heathen in Russia but he was worn out by the demands of his austere lifestyle.  Now he knew he was dying and asked to be taken to one of his own monasteries at Bologna, where he died on August 4th.  Dominic was a humble, devout and modest man.  Once, when he and his followers arrived late at a monastery and found the monks had already gone to bed, he said, "Don't wake them.  We can sleep on the steps."  His personality was quite different from the stern, uncompromising face that his order was to acquire in decades to come.  Dominic himself was warm, generous, moderate, rather soft-hearted and extremely likekable.

PRAYER:

   Wonderful Saintly Founder of the elquent Order of Preachers and friend of St. Francis of Assisi, you were a fiery defender of the Faith and a fighter against the darkness of heresy.  You resembled a great star that shone close to the world and painted to the Light which was Christ.  Help astronomers to study the stars and admire their wonderful Maker, proclaiming: "Give glory to God in the highest.  Amen."