I ran across this beautiful site produced by English Dominican students which is full of rich, deep content. Currently they are doing daily meditations for Advent, and as we get close to Christmas, they are featuring the Great Antiphons of Advent. The site also includes multimedia content including chants of the antiphons and videos of some of their preaching.

For those who don’t know what a Dominican is, or what they have to do with dogs, here is a little background. St. Dominic was a Spanish Catholic priest who lived 800 years ago during a time when there were problems with corruption, ignorance, and heresy in the Church. When he witnessed some of these problems during his travels, he was led to begin a religious order called the “Order of Preachers”, which had the task of raising up and training dedicated men to preach the Truth of Christ. He emphasized prayer, study, and community as a way to build up this army of preachers who could combat these problems. He then went around Europe establishing Houses of Study at which to train these preachers. Because St. Dominic is the founder of the Order of Preachers (O.P.), they are often known as Dominicans.

So where do dogs come in? To answer that, I will quote the “about” page from the site.

The name “Dominican“, although derived from the name of our holy father and Founder, St Dominic, is also a pun on the Latin phrase “Domini canes” which means “Dogs of the Lord.”

This was itself based on a dream which St Dominic’s mother, Blessed Juana de Aza, had in 1170 when she was pregnant: she saw a black and white dog with a torch in its mouth setting the world ablaze. This was interpreted to refer to St Dominic and his spiritual children, the Dominican Order - in their black and white habits - whose preaching brings the light of Gospel truth to shine upon and inflame the world with divine love.

And so, this site represents the ‘barks’ of this pack of ‘God’s dogs’, hopefully gathering all into the flock of Jesus Christ, the Good Shepherd!