Culture

Eight Hundred Years and Tweeting

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Detail of Saint Dominic of Guzmán by Claudio Coello (Museo Nacional del Prado)
From the 13th century, the Dominican order lives.

On Saturday morning, #OP800 started trending on Twitter. Throughout the world, people were tweeting birthday wishes to the Dominicans, known as the “Order of Preachers,” the Catholic religious order founded by St. Dominic 800 years ago on the opening of their jubilee year of celebration. The tweeting began on the 800th minute of the day in Rome, 7:20 a.m. on the east coast.

As a longtime friend of the Dominicans, I wasn’t going to miss the once in 800 year event. (I’m a graduate of Dominican Academy in Manhattan and inventor and incessant Twitter promoter of the #OPPower hashtag. Seeing them in their black and white habits processing into the Basilica of the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception adjacent to the Catholic University of America for the Vigil for Life before the annual March for Life one year, I was inspired.) For anyone who has ever heard the compelling preaching, joined in the fervent prayer, or watched their joyful engagement in the streets of New York or Washington, D.C. (a surprise on a subway, for sure, for many), it is a welcome jubilee.

Fr. Cassian Derbes, O.P., is parochial vicar at St. Patrick’s Church in Columbus, Ohio — and adjunct faculty at the Pontifical College Josephinum there — and serves as the Provincial Promoter for the 800th Jubilee of the Order of Preachers. We talk about those 800 years with Fr. Cassian, a native of Louisiana and a convert to Catholicism, who was ordained a priest in 2014.

Kathryn Jean Lopez: How does a jubilee change a Dominican life?

Fr. Cassian Derbes, O.P.: A jubilee reminds us that we can have joy in what is given to us. Joy, when united to the truth, fosters the virtue of hope. There is great hope in the Order of Preachers! Kathryn, you’ve been around the Dominican House of Studies — you know what it is when you see it!

Lopez: Some might suggest that playing up the 800 years might give the impression you’re stuck in the past. What’s the perspective to be gained, especially here in America? What’s the relevance?

Fr. Cassian: In my experience, people are impressed to hear that the Order of Preachers, beginning this year, will celebrate our 800th birthday. These same people look with great interest at a young man or young woman who, in this free society, walks around a modern American city in a 13th-century religious habit. Joy, a lively intelligence, and more vocations than we have seen in 50 years, indicate to them — immediately and intuitively — that the Order of Preachers is ever ancient, ever new.

Lopez: Does the longevity bring you some peace?

Fr. Cassian: When Our Lord gives us the gift of peace, He unites us to Himself. To know peace is to be united to Jesus Christ in this loving friendship, which He establishes. There is nothing more exciting in the world, than to know the nearness of the Lord — to know His love and providential hand. Peace unites us with its source, and the long providence of the Order of Preachers reminds us that God is faithful; it reminds us that when God gives grace, He gives in abundance.

Lopez: What has St. Dominic meant for your priesthood?

Fr. Cassian: The saints image for us what it means to put on grace. We call St. Dominic a “light of the Church,” and he serves as a stunning example of what it means to be an effective and humble instrument of divine grace. A priest, by sacramental character — like St. Dominic, the priest — has the power to be that good, effective, and humble instrument of grace. For me, to be a Dominican priest is to want to be fashioned as a priest in the image of St. Dominic — to be an instrument like him.

Lopez: How did you find yourself among these 800-year-olds?

Fr. Cassian: I felt called to the Dominican Province of St. Joseph. I was attracted to the vibrant community life and the serious life of prayer, especially the chanting of the Psalms. The full-bodied teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas convinced me of the Dominican form, and I knew that my salvation rested on the obedience to the truth, which Thomas taught better than anyone I had ever known — the kind that has the power to lead you to heaven. The more I came to know St. Dominic, the more I fell in love, and the more I wanted to be like him.

Lopez: In 800 years, how many Dominican saints have there been?

Fr. Cassian: The Order of Preachers, to date, claims 103 canonized saints and 374 blesseds.

Lopez: You’re gathered around the Columbus statehouse later this month for a big celebration. Are we to believe the Dominicans settled Ohio?

There is nothing more exciting in the world, than to know the nearness of the Lord — to know His love and providential hand.

Fr. Cassian: Fr. Edward Dominic Fenwick, O.P. — the founder of the Dominican Province of St. Joseph (Eastern, USA) — brought the Catholic religion to the state of Ohio. He was the first priest to settle in the state of Ohio, he celebrated its first Mass, and he brought with him members of this 800-year-old religious community called the Dominicans. Fenwick arrived in 1808: Five short years after the founding of the state of Ohio, he became the state’s first bishop; and Dominican friars, sisters, and laity have been serving the citizens of the state of Ohio — in all corners of the state — since the early 19th century, for the common good.

LOPEZ: What is the Dominican difference?

Fr. Cassian: “Only the truth has grace.”

Lopez: How can non-Dominicans be a part of the festivities?

Fr. Cassian: Join us: jubilee.opeast.org.

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