Charity
A Threefold Cord
A threefold cord is not easily broken, says Qoheleth, the sage (Eccl 4:12). The Lord thus wisely gives us a threefold program for our Lenten journey: prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. The Old Testament knew all three practices, but only individually. It never held them together in this evangelical recipe. Jesus alone shows us how to bind the strong man fast (Mk 3:27).
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The Feast of Saint Antoninus of Florence
Today, May 10th, is the feast of St. Antoninus, a Dominican friar & Archbishop. Consecrated as Archbishop of Florence in 1446, St Antoninus immediately embarked on a steady program of reform marked by the austere simplicity of his own lifestyle as Archbishop, and by his constant concern for the poor. To mitigate the wide-spread Read more…
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St. Martin de Porres
Known as the “Apostle of Charity,” Martin de Porres (1579 – 1639) was born in Lima, Peru, the son of a slave. While a young man, he was accepted as a cooperator brother at the Dominican priory in Lima and spent his life there as a barber, farm laborer, and the like. Helping in the Read more…
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St. Antoninus
At sixteen, Antoninus (1389 – 1459) joined the Dominican Order and for the next forty years served as local or provincial superior in various Italian priories. He founded the convent of San Marco under the patronage of Cosimo de Medici and also under the sodality of St. Martin. In 1446 Antoninus was appointed archbishop of Read more…
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St. Agnes of Montepulciano
A Dominican nun, Agnes (1268 – 1317) was renowned for her diligence in prayer and her extraordinary charity. Although born of a wealthy family in Gracchiano, Italy, she believed that charity is the only way to acquire the virtue of humility: there is no humility without charity; the one nourishes the other. She first joined Read more…
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Death of St. Dominic
On August 6, 1221, less than five years after the Holy See formally confirmed the founding of the Order of Preachers, Dominic died in Bologna, the site of one of the Dominicans’ principal university houses and schools of theology. Just before his death Dominic called first all the novices around him and then the oldest Read more…
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St. Dominic Offers Himself as Ransom
A second example of Dominic’s heroic charity occurred while he was still a student in Palencia. To secure the freedom of a man held in slavery by the Moors, Dominic, whose funds had been exhausted during the time of the famine, offered to sell himself as ransom for the prisoner. Although the slave traders rejected Read more…
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St. Dominic Sells His Books
Throughout his life Dominic preached charity and acted accordingly. In 1190, while he was studying in Palencia, a famine devastated all of Spain. Palencia suffered with the rest of the country, and people died of starvation in the streets. Moved with pity at the sight of the dying poor, Dominic resolved to put into practice Read more…
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