2022 Summer Reading Recommendations:
Saint Dominic’s Way of Life: A Path to Knowing and Loving God 
by Patrick Mary Briscoe, O.P. and Jacob Bertrand Janczyk, O.P.

Throughout the centuries, the saints have done some incredible things. The Apostle Paul preached while suffering imprisonment, beatings, and even shipwreck. Pope Leo the Great averted Attila the Hun from sacking the Eternal City. Benedict turned away from worldly allurements to bring a stable form of consecrated life to the West. Peter Damian was called from his monastic cloister to work for clerical reform throughout Europe. In a foreign land, Isaac Jogues faced mutilation from those he tried to help. Maximilian Kolbe gave his life to become the Martyr of Charity amid the cruelties of the Second World War. 

In the midst of such witnesses to the Christian life, our own Christian lives can sometimes seem a little lackluster. It’s easy to start thinking that we can only be measured by the greatness of our deeds; the more extraordinary, the better, right? But amid these thoughts, we can actually turn again to the saints to learn a completely different lesson—something of a corrective to the bigger-is-better attitude. The saints teach us—by the very deeds that sometimes make us feel like mediocre Christians—the great value of the ordinary life of holiness that God offers his people. The great deeds of the saints are, after all, manifestations of God’s divine life at work in the saints. Yet this divine life is not given exclusively to the great saints. It is shared with all the baptized, though in ways proportionate to God’s will for each person. The ordinary holiness that so many are called to live is thus no trifling matter. Rather, it is God’s divine life, proportioned to each of us according to God’s plan for our lives.

This lesson is the very one given in a recently-published book, called Saint Dominic’s Way of Life: A Path to Knowing and Loving God by Fr. Patrick Mary Briscoe, O.P., and Fr. Jacob Bertrand Janczyk, O.P. The book offers what a typical biography of a saint would offer, tracing out Saint Dominic’s upbringing, his response to his vocation, his work in the Church, and his death. Yet the hallmark of this book is how the authors constantly bring Dominic’s own life to bear on the lives of ordinary Christians—Christians who will probably not found an order, reform the clergy, or die as martyrs for Christ.

For example, Dominic’s intense life of study and love of learning teaches us how important study and learning are for every Christian. Yet his example should not make us think that, in order to be holy, we need to spend hours and hours in study as Dominic did, or that our study must be ordered to some grand endeavor, such as teaching hostile heretics the truth of the Gospel. Rather than specifying the particulars of how this important element of Christian life should be carried out, Dominic’s life shows us what God’s grace is able to accomplish by as simple an activity as studying, particularly, studying the sacred scriptures; “[f]or Dominic, God’s mercy and power leapt from the pages of Scripture, and he was impelled to share the wondrous things he read and prayed” (26). 800 years later, we too can follow Dominic’s example of Christian study, whether it be by reading a theology book or by meditating for 15 minutes on the Sunday gospel reading. 

Study is just one aspect among many in Dominic’s life that Frs. Briscoe and Janczyk point out for their readers. Dominic’s zeal for sharing the Gospel, his appreciation for friendship, and his love for the Blessed Mother likewise guide the ordinary Christian in the universal call to holiness—not necessarily in the same manner as Saint Dominic, but for the same reason, namely, for love of the Lord Jesus.

I highly recommend this little book. It’s the sort that you can return to again and again. Its simple language makes its timeless truth accessible to anyone wishing to grow in the spiritual life. Whenever readers take up this little book—either to read or to re-read it—they will find an invitation to grow in the ordinary holiness that God offers to us every day. May Saint Dominic show himself a father and help us by his example and prayer.

✠

Image: Fra Angelico, Detail from The Mocking of Christ