Saturday, August 21, 2010
Our Lady of The Valley
1122 Linden
PO Box 399
Caldwell, ID 83605
office:
(208) 459-3653 Fax: (208) 454-8789
PILLAR OF STUDY
I. Pillar of Study
Study is a way of life for the Lay Dominican; inseparable from prayer and the apostolate, the three fuse in mutual support. Ideally, study, prayer, and apostolate merge to form a whole new way of living and experiencing of you are and who God is in your life. By applying our “minds” to reality we seek truth and dispose ourselves to receive it humbly and charitably. And by applying our “hearts” to this known truth, we seek not just to live it but to become it. Truth becomes incarnate in our lives as we share in the divine life of Jesus Christ. But this rests on study. Learning comes before everything else, including holiness and experience. It is impossible to fulfill the contemplative and apostolic ends of the Dominican Oder without study.
Read, No. III on "Study" of the Formation Program (Anderson). Click Here.
The Necessity of Study: Check out the following biblical references regarding study: Matthew 13:52; Acts 2:42; Titus 1:1-9; 1 Peter 3:15. Jesus Christ is the principal theme of the Pillar of Study. Here is a link to the Holy Bible: Douay Rheims or New American Bible.
II. Read the part of the following article entitled “St. Dominic Nourished in the ‘Sacred Page,’” which is only a small part of the following article: Click here. [“Module No. 1” (Three pages)].
The main article is entitled "The Holy Scriptures Central to Dominican Formation." A portion of that article is entitled “St. Dominic Nourished in the ‘Sacred Page.’” It is about St. Dominic's love of the Holy Scriptures is is central to the Pillar of Study.
III. Read and Review Study and the Lay Dominican. Click, here.
IV. See the following video with regard to the Pillar of Study by the Vicar of the Master General for the Dominican Order. This video is a brief introduction to the importance of Study to the Dominican, whether a Friar, religious, or lay member of the Order of Preachers. It was put together for the 2010 General Chapter of the Order in Rome: Click here.
V. Fausto Appetente Die. Pope Benedict XV, June 24, 1921.
Benedict XV gives light to St. Dominic’s life and his life of study and prayer, and by way of example, to the Lay Dominican as well. You can read it by clicking here. This is a vital read. Here are samples.
“…[I]n addition to the duty of cultivating poverty, innocence of life, and religious discipline, he commanded his Order in a strict and solemn manner to be zealous in the study of Christian doctrine and the preaching of the truth.
“In the Dominican preaching three qualities shine forth: great solidity of doctrine, the fullness of fidelity towards the Apostolic See, piety towards the Virgin Mother.
… “[T]he Dominican institute from the beginning was famed for its learning. Its special mission was always to care for the various wounds of error and to diffuse the light of the Christian Faith, seeing that nothing is such a hindrance to eternal salvation was the ignorance of the truth and perversity of doctrine.
“History tells, too, how when he was training his first followers to Christian perfection, Dominic thought of gathering from pious and devout lay people a certain sacred militia which would defend the rights of the Church and res heresy with vigor. Hence arose the Third Order of the Dominicans which, spreading among lay people the institute of a more perfect life, was to be a truly great ornament and defense to the Church.”
VI. The Holy Father, Paul VI, issued an Apostolic Letter on October 4, 1970, declaring St. Catherine of Siena as a Doctor of the Church. Clearly, she used her knowledge from study and from the Divine to encounter the politicians and influential people of her day. See it here: http://www.kenrickparish.com/mcdermott/Mirabilis%20in%20ecclesia%20Deus.pdf Mirabilis Ecclesia Deus, Apostolic Letter, October 4, 1970, (declaring St. Catherine of Siena as Doctor of the Church).