How to Preach

 Robert Curtis' new Lay Dominican book, From the Devotional to Preaching is meant to help Lay Dominicans get out of the "prayer group" mode.  Way too often, the Lay Dominican Fraternities settle for meeting once a month to pray.  They seem to suffer from inertia.

Curtis' book shows them how to move from sitting back to get going. Lay Dominicans belong to the Order of Preachers.  They should be preaching and this book shows them how.  Actually, preaching opportunities abound, if only the Laity had eyes to see.  Not only are preaching opportunities presented but other books, periodicals, etc. listed. 

My First Book

 See me.  That's my selfie, under Bob's picture.  I helped Mr. Robert Curtis, O.P. write this book.  Chapter IX was my contribution.  Now, we just have to promote the book.  

Title:     The Handbook for Ongoing Lay Dominican Formation

Author:  Mr. Robert Curtis, O.P., M.F.A.

Publisher: Barnes & Noble Press

Contact for Information:  Institute for Lay Dominican Preaching

Courage and Will

The Courage and Will to Preach/ Lay Dominicans At The Edge of the World by Mr. Robert Curtis, O.P. is a manual for Lay Dominicans.

Lay Dominicans are ordinary people associated with the Order of Preachers.  The Order of Preachers is a religious order just like Franciscans and Jesuits.  The Order of Preachers was founded by Saint Dominic, hence they are better known as Dominicans. The lay people who follow the spirituality of Saint Dominic are called Lay Dominicans.  This book could be called a manual for Lay Dominicans.

It provides the background of the evolution of Lay Dominicans.  Also, it provides the how-to and to whom they should preach.  Mr. Curtis calls Lay Dominicans to duty.  They are drafted!

The times call for preachers just such as them. Social Doctrine, Encyclicals, Apostolic Letters, Dominican General Chapter Declarations, all offer reasons for the laity to enter today's world fray.  It's less than $ 15.  Here are the product details:

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9798823130080
Publisher:	Barnes & Noble Press
Publication date:	10/12/2022
Pages:	368
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.82(d)

Here is a biography of the author, Mr. Robert Curtis, O.P.  "Robert Curtis is a life-professed lay Dominican of 30 years in the Western Province, U.S.A. He is a professor of English at a local college and is married to his wife, Maria, also a lay Dominican of 30 years, with three children, and five grandchildren. His youngest daughter, Jennifer, is also a lay Dominican. This is his 7th book on the Order along with 33 other books to his name."

An Artist's Prayer

The Crucified Christ by Fra Angelico circa 1395-1455

While perusing my news feed on Facebook, I came across a post by a brother Lay Dominican, Robert Curtis.  (My brother, by a different mother, but still my brother.)  He posted a poem he found in National Review, December 2014.  It's about another brother.  (See above parenthetical explanation.)  The poem is about Fra Angelico.  Fra Angelico was born Guido di Pietro. When he entered the Order of Preachers (Dominicans) he was given the religious name Brother John of Fiesole.  He was an artist.  He painted like an angel, hence the nickname Fra Angelico.  His painting was his prayer to God.  His work preached the Word.

Angelico’s Crucifixion
By Lee Oser

Tempura and gold on wood, circa 1445
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Fifth Avenue

Here is faith’s erotic life.
Prayer’s unfallen touch, whose brushstrokes hold
Strange virtues even now to halt
And hush our steps beneath the Cross of Love:

Magdelen staggers at the foot,
Her hair and dress a flame, her back to us; 
In rapt obedience in her mantle’s
Quiet blue, Mary seems small for her fate;

By hours the painter would have prayed
Like Dominic, as if his knees were stone, 
Low as the earth His blood does stain,
Adoring heaven’s patience without pride;

Knowing that truth becomes a book,
Augustine reads, his mother simply sees; 
The Lord’s beloved disciple sways
As one whose heart for joy or sorrow broke;

Francis, Thomas, Elizabeth
Perfect the number of this hallowed guild,
Who light a place where loss is gold,
So bent by love we hesitate to breathe---

Or else might feel perversely pressed
To scatter those proud saints like little birds
And batter down those brutal boards
And glide away with head bowed like a priest.

·         Found in National Review, December 2014.

Interesting New Blog

Have you ever heard of "postmodernism?" I just read about it on a brand new blog. The blog is operated by a Lay Dominican exploring all the aspects and effects upon society by postmodernism. Bob, the blogger, is interested in the theological view.

Take a look and see how he defines: relativism, secularization and of course modernism and postmodernism. This blog will be interesting.

Postmodernism is not a once-and-for-all philosophical construct. It does not begin at the end of modernism but runs concurrently from its first proposals to the present time. How postmodernism affects one area of human endeavor in one decade may not affect another until later decades. However, I believe that postmodernism has a natural evolution within the spectrum of human endeavor. ... Postmodernism, as a whole, ran concurrent to modernism which reached politics in the 1910s to the 1940s where both Communism and National Socialism rose to power.

I'll try to keep my comments on the blog relative to his definitions and their explanations. Independent thinkers welcome.