Novena to St Dominic - Day 1

During the past week at Mass, we have been hearing parables of Jesus about the kingdom of heaven, as recounted by St Matthew.  It is a treasure more valuable than all earthly possessions; a priceless pearl; a tiny mustard-seed that grows to become a great shrub where birds of the air can build a home.

And today, curiously, it is likened to a dragnet whose haul of fish has to be sifted and sorted, so that what is useless is thrown out, and the good saved.

St Peter, providentially, was a fisherman whom the Lord called to be a fisher of men.

And St Dominic, providentially, lived during days that are very much like our own.  Like St Peter, his mission was to spend his life and his love for the Lord - seeking out and bringing into the light of truth, so many souls - as many as he could - who would otherwise have been lost, through the many erroneous beliefs held by people who had lost faith in humanity.

At the end of each day, when we sing to St Dominic, we call upon him as ‘light of the Church’, and although over 800 years have passed since his death, we depend on his intercession as much in our day, as his brethren drew strength from his teaching and wisdom, while he lived among them.

St Dominic received the light of his faith from the countless hours he spent in prayer at the foot of the Cross, begging the Lord’s mercy of poor sinners.

Apart from God, men forget their dignity and lose sight of their greatness and magnificence and the love in which they were created.  They can descend into darkness and hopelessness and finding a way back to light seems impossible.

But the light that St Dominic preached is a light of mercy: we may lose hope in mankind, be overwhelmed by our capacity for the most horrific evil.  But the Lord is like the Divine Potter, of whom Isaiah prophesied: it is within His power to heal us and transform us; to re-shape us and uncover the light He planted within us at our Baptism.  His mercy towards is pure light, because it is pure love.

Our task, as was St Dominic’s, in praying for souls, is to be like the fishermen with the dragnet: not so much to throw away what is of no use, but to help souls to see that there is a way back; to help them to see the light; to encourage them to offer themselves to the Lord and allow Him, in His mercy, to save them.  And what then, will they see?  That they themselves are the treasure and the pearl, for whom He laid down His life.

May St Dominic intercede for us, that we may be faithful to our calling, and never forget that the light with which he set the world on fire, is the light of Christ, a light of mercy.