Much can be said about St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274, feast – Jan. 28). The way the Order’s liturgy describes him is one of the most helpful.  In the old Dominican Breviary, there is an antiphon that sums up the whole Dominican liturgy’s presentation of Thomas:

The Blessed Thomas, Doctor of the Church, light of the world, glory of Italy, virgin shining with the bloom of chastity, rejoices in a twofold crown of glory.

Over and over the liturgy speaks of his two crowns – virgin and doctor.

St. Thomas’s story of virginity took a dramatic turn soon after he entered the Dominicans.  His family was unhappy with his choice of the Dominicans, so they captured him and had him locked up in the family jail.  In trying to get him to leave the Order, his brothers brought a loose woman to entice him to break his vow of chastity.  He chased her out of the room with a log from the fire, marked the door with the Sign of the Cross, and then thanked God for preserving his chastity.  It is said that after this, two angels came and girded him with a cord that helped to preserve his chastity throughout the rest of his life.

St. Thomas’s learning and wisdom is famous.  He gave the Church the Summa Theologica, the Summa Contra Gentiles, a number of Scriptural commentaries, commentaries on the works of Aristotle, and a host of other texts.  Some of his writings, especially his teachings on the Eucharist, have made it into the magisterial teachings of the Church, and they continued to be promoted by the Papacy, especially since the time of Pope Leo XIII.

Virginity and wisdom – such are two pillars by which we can come to understand the life of St. Thomas.  As he pointed out, purity can aid the intellectual life (see Summa Theologica I-II, 33, 3, ad 2).  It would seem that thanks to Thomas’s perseverance in chastity and the Lord’s protection through the angelic cord, Thomas’s writings were able to be all the more profound.

May we too be given the grace to live lives of purity and chastity so that like St. Thomas, we might come to know the Lord more intimately and desire nothing but Him.

O God, you make your Church glorious through the wonderful teaching of the blessed Thomas, your confessor and doctor, and render it fruitful by his holy deeds; grant us, we beseech you, both to understand what he taught and to imitate what he did.  Through Christ our Lord.

Proclaim the word; be persistent whether it is convenient or inconvenient; convince, reprimand, encourage, through all patience and teaching. (2 Timothy 4.2)

Today we follow an apostolic feast with an episcopal memorial. On the heels of celebrating St. Paul’s conversion, we celebrate two of his intimés, Sts. Timothy and Titus. In the New Testament, we find their names at the head of letters St. Paul addressed specifically to them. Letters to individual pastors of churches—distinct from letters to Christian communities as such—1, 2 Timothy and Titus are dubbed “Pastoral Epistles.”

“Epistle” is, more or less, another word for “letter.” In using “epistle,” we evoke the notion and mission of an “apostle.” But for a couple of vowels, the words are the same; they have , in fact, the same root. An epistle is a message sent-to someone; and an apostle is an individual sent-from Christ. Hence, although letter-writing is a basic and widespread feature of ancient communication, the Apostolic Epistle is a unique literary genre of faith.

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Each week, a Dominican member of the Provincial Preaching Advisory board prepares this Preacher’s Sketchbook in anticipation of the upcoming Sunday Mass.  The idea of the Preacher’s Sketchbook is to take quotations from the authority of the Church–the Pope, the Fathers of the Church, documents of the Councils, the saints–that can help spark ideas for the Sunday homily.   Just as an artist’s sketchbook preserves ideas for later elaboration, so we hope the Preacher’s Sketchbook will provide some ideas for homiletical elaboration.

Sketchbook

Bl. Pope John Paul II, Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Pastores Dabo Vobis

Jesus thus established a close relationship between the ministry entrusted to the apostles and his own mission: “He who receives you receives me, and he who receives me receives him who sent me” (Mt 10,40); “He who hears you hears me, and he who rejects you rejects me, and he who rejects me rejects him who sent me” (Lc 10,16). Indeed, in the light of the paschal event of the death and resurrection, the fourth Gospel affirms this with great force and clarity: “As the Father has sent me, even so I send you” (Jn 20,21 cf. Jn 13,20 Jn 17,18). Just as Jesus has a mission which comes to him directly from God and makes present the very authority of God (cf. Mt 7,29 Mt 21,23 Mc 1,27 Mc 11,28 Lc 20,2 Lc 24,19), so too the apostles have a mission which comes to them from Jesus. And just as “the Son can do nothing of his own accord” (Jn 5,19) such that his teaching is not his own but the teaching of the One who sent him (cf. Jn 7,16), so Jesus says to the apostles: “Apart from me you can do nothing” (Jn 15,5). Their mission is not theirs but is the same mission of Jesus. All this is possible not as a result of human abilities, but only with the “gift” of Christ and his Spirit, with the “sacrament”: “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained” (Jn 20,22-23). And so the apostles, not by any special merit of their own, but only through a gratuitous participation in the grace of Christ, prolong throughout history to the end of time the same mission of Jesus on behalf of humanity.

The sign and presupposition of the authenticity and fruitfulness of this mission is the apostles’ unity with Jesus and, in him, with one another and with the Father – as the priestly prayer of our Lord, which sums up his mission, bears witness (cf. Jn 17,20-23).

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On Monday, January 23, friars from the Dominican House of Studies joined thousands of pro-life advocates on the annual March for Life in Washington, DC. Marching together under the banner “Dominican Friars for Life,” the friars were joined by parishioners from the Dominican parishes of St. Patrick (Columbus, OH), St. Gertrude (Cincinnati, OH) and St. Dominic (Youngstown, OH), students from Providence College, and sisters from the congregations of St. Cecilia and Mary, Mother of the Eucharist. Together with the special Masses and Holy Hours celebrated over the course of the weekend, the March was a beautiful opportunity to witness to the sanctity of life and to join in prayer for an end to abortion.

Fr. Bill Garrott, O.P. is prior of St. Louis Bertrand in Louisville, KY. He is also a mission preacher and a former director of vocations. Here is the text from his Sunday homily.

The cathode ray tube TV is now obsolete. The flat screen TV is in. Razor sharp images. Extra wide screens. The new TVs have a draw back though. If the screen isn’t adjusted properly, everyone looks shorter and 10 pounds heavier. Last week while visiting my sister, I offered to adjust the screen to make the people look normal. “Don’t touch it!” she said “because I’ll never figure out how to change it back when you leave!” So we watched people on TV who appeared to be crushed by the gravitational pull of the planet Jupiter. How many times have you heard this blurb just before a movie plays: “This movie has been modified from its original version. It has been formatted to fit your screen.” The problem is that movie theater screens are still much wider than the your new TV. And when you do watch a TV movie in its original version, you see a dark border above and below the picture on your TV. That’s when you say, “Why did we spend a fortune on a 50 inch screen if 1/3 of it isn’t utilized? So to avoid making you feel that irritation, they format movies to fit your entire screen. But something is sacrificed in the process. Namely, what the film director wanted you to see in the first place. When the movie is formatted to fit your screen, another editor zooms in on what he thinks is the most important aspect of the scene. Peripheral characters and details are simply chopped off. And you wouldn’t know unless you saw the original movie.

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Fr. Gabriel Gillen, O.P. hosts another edition of Word to Life with Fr. Bruno M. Shah, O.P. and FOCUS Missionary at NYU, Chris Schilmoeller.

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The Thomistic Institute at the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception will be hosting an honorary lecture by Prof. F. Russell Hittinger.  Prof. Hittinger will speak on the topic: Can You Be the Imago Dei on Your Own? Modern Thomism on the Social Character of Human Existence. The lecture will on Thursday, January 26, 2012 at 7:00pm at the Dominican House of Studies.  The event is free and open to the public.

Prof. Hittinger is the William K. Warren Professor of Catholic Studies and a Research Professor of Law at the University of Tulsa.  He describes his academic work as “the intersection of philosophy, law, and theology.”  He is currently at work on a book on the evolution of Catholic social theory and doctrine during the 19th and 20th centuries.

For more information, please see the website of the Thomistic Institute.

The short review: excellent. That’s a simple way to sum up this co-production by the Storm Theater and the Blackfriars Repertory Theater.”

New York Times review is a complete rave, praising Blackfriars’ Theatre, a ministry of the Province of St. Joseph, for producing “first rate theatre.“

“There are so many surprises in the 2 hours and 10 minutes of “The London Merchant” that you may have to remind yourself that yes, you are in a basement that houses the Theater of the Church of Notre Dame, a space far off the radar of most audiences. That’s not a snobbish statement, but rather an acknowledgment that, in New York, out-of-the-way places can produce some first-rate theater.”

For the full review of the play, see the New York Times.

The London Merchant” continues through Jan. 28 at the Theater of the Church of Notre Dame, 405 West 114th Street, Morningside Heights; (212) 868-4444, stormtheatre.com.

St. Margaret of Hungary (1242-1270, feast – Jan. 18) embarked upon her vocation very early.  Her father, King Bela IV of Hungary, was worried about an impending invasion of the Tartars in his kingdom, and so he and his wife promised the Lord that they would offer their first daughter to God if He protected their kingdom.  King Bela was victorious over the Tartars and soon after Margaret was born.  She was sent to the Dominican monastery at Vesprim when she was only three years old.

St. Margaret was soon noted for devotion.  She had memorized the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin within six months from entering, she received the habit by her fourth birthday, and she smothered the Crucifix when she learned of what it was a sign, saying “Lord, I give and abandon myself to Thee for ever.”  Some might have thought that this fervent devotion would pass as she grew up.  Yet, she made solemn profession at the age of 12, and when her parents received a dispensation from her vows so that she could leave the monastery and get married, she chose to stay married to her heavenly Spouse rather than forsake Him for an earthly one.  According to the Rite found in the Roman Pontifical, she was solemnly veiled at the altar of her aunt St. Elizabeth of Hungary.

As she continued in the monastic life, St. Margaret continued to grow in holiness, and the interior holiness she possessed manifested itself in outward works.  She, a princess by birth, took the lowliest tasks: sweeping, scrubbing the dishes, working with the poor, caring for the sick sisters in the infirmity, no matter what sickness brought them there.  She was content to serve them so that she might draw closer to the Lord.

St. Margaret offers us a great witness of fidelity to the Lord.  In her, we can see that when the faith of children is fostered and when aided by God’s grace, the hope of eternal life can take root in the soul and lead to a life of joy and sanctity.

O God, the rewarder of faithful souls, who didst enrich Thy holy Virgin, the Blessed Margaret, with spiritual gifts and eternal joys for her perfect renunciation and constant mortification, grant that we, through her prayers and example, may destroy the vices of the flesh, despise all earthly things, and so attain to everlasting life.  Through Christ our Lord.