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Sponsored by the Vocation Ministers of the Northeast Dominican 6 Congregations
More on the Dominican Way of Life or Charism:
the deep search
To Praise, To Bless, To Preach - the integration of all aspects of our life.
The Four Pillars - the basics of Dominican Life.
Mission - our life in community with God, self, others and the earth.
Jesus, Our Brother,
You gathered
all sorts of people,
-- ate and drank with them. You gather us:
Saints and sinners alike.
Be with us
as we rejoice in each others gifts
as we struggle through our differences
as we suffer our losses
and pain.
Give us the courage
to speak the Truth in love.
Give us the patience
to respect what we do not understand.
Make us persistent
in the search for truth that your Word may be known.
Together, we can do more than alone.
Love us into joy and hope as a people made one in You that the world may know the Good News.
We ask this confident in the Spirit You have sent to be with us now and forever. Amen.
COMMON LIFE + RELATIONSHIP + COMMON LIFE + POVERTY + COMMON LIFE + CHASTITY + COMMON LIFE + OBEDIENCE + COMMON LIFE + LIFE ON THE PLANET + COMMON LIFE +
Poverty
Dominic recognized that the mission of the holy preaching in his day had often been hampered by the scandals of wealth and power in the Church. As an itinerant mendicant Order, Dominic sought that his followers put their trust in God’s providence and live voluntary poverty.
Obedience
For Dominicans obedience is a promise to be faithful to the deep listening for God’s call. Once heard, obedience requires that we act upon it. The vow is received in mutuality for the call must be submitted for discernment not by the member alone but in terms of the common call of the Dominican community, church and the world.
Obedience demands prayer and willingness to put our very lives at the feet of another for the sake of mission. Again and again we are called to the obedience of going to meetings so we can seek the truth of the common good in prayer and contemplation.
Consecrated Celibacy
Chastity or Consecrated celibacy recognizes the testament of God’s love and a call to love beyond ourselves with faithfulness. To be fully lived, this vow calls for an integration of our whole person including our sexuality.
Dominican life is not an escape from the world but an immersion into it. Through prayer, contemplation, and study in common one is brought face to face with the truth.
What does it mean for the World?
The Common Life calls us to create a world in which all flourish. How do we live in terms of the common good of all?
The vows of Marriage taken by some of our lay associates have their own forms of obedience, poverty, and chastity. The Dominican Life calls all to examine our lives in terms of our openness and recognition of our interdependence
with all on this planet.
If we do not have time for one another, if we do not know those with whom we live, how can we know and proclaim God’s presence to the world? The Common Life calls us to be faithful to the search for truth in prayer, study, mission, and our lives together
As God said to Catherine of Siena in her Dialogues: “I could well have made human being in such a way that they all had everything, but I preferred to give different gifts to different people, so that they would all need each other.”
In a culture where individualism and consumerism are valued, Dominicans sharing the Common Life through profession of their vows or bonds of affiliation are clearly going against the norms of our society. We look at life through the lens of the Common Good for ourselves and our world.
The Order of Preachers sharing the Gospel for over 800 years.
The Common Life challenges us with interdependence and diversity. It challenges us as it opens us up to others and calls us to grapple with differences. Dominican life is not about uniformity but rather is a celebration of unity in diversity. It raises the question of the common good in all areas of community life and in the community of this planet.
The celebration of the founding of the Order of Preachers 800 years ago has renewed the call to collaboration of the Dominican family in all its members: sisters, nuns, friars, laity, associates and volunteers. The diversity of members open us further as we share our understandings of the charism and live out our baptism calling.
