HOMILY for Dedication of the Priory Church of Saint Dominic
Apoc 21:2-5; Luke 19:1-10
It was only on the 1st of August in 1923 that this Dominican priory church was consecrated, some forty years after it had been opened in 1883. This church, reputedly the fifth largest in London, had cost £40,000 to build and it took those four decades for the Dominicans, relying on the help of countless benefactors, to completely pay for the building; churches cannot be consecrated if they remain in debt, hence the interval between the opening and the consecration of this church. Already in 1863, twenty years before the church was opened, the foundation stone (which is still visible from the Rosary Garden) had been laid by the Master of the Dominican Order, Jandel. Present at this historic event was the Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, Nicholas Wiseman, who had invited the Dominican friars back to London after the desolation wrought by the English Reformation after 1538. However, the Dominicans who first arrived in England 800 years ago in 1221 had built their first London Priory in Holborn in August 1223. And so, 700 years later, on this day in 1923, this great church, the fourth Blackfriars of London, was consecrated by Cardinal Bourne to continue the Dominican mission of preaching for the salvation of souls in the capital city of this United Kingdom.
Cardinal Bourne’s successor, Vincent Cardinal Nichols would elevate this church to the dignity of a Marian Shrine, the Rosary Shrine, in October 2016, thus completing the pious desire of Cardinal Wiseman that this church should serve his Diocese (and this nation) as a Shrine to Our Lady of the Rosary. The Cardinal’s wish was that “the faithful [would] make pilgrimages to the Shrine to seek the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary through the prayer of the Most Holy Rosary, and to draw closer to her Son, Jesus Christ”, and thus he gave to this church “all the duties, obligations, rights, and privileges of a Diocesan Shrine as established by Canon Law.”
Hence, following the usual conditions (confession, usually within a week; receiving Holy Communion; and prayer for the Holy Father) a plenary indulgence is granted to all of you who come to this Shrine church today. Likewise, a plenary indulgence will be granted on Wednesday, the 4th of August if you attend the Dominican Rite High Mass at 6pm, and again next Sunday on the 8th of August, which is the new feast of St Dominic in the current liturgical calendar.
The gift of indulgences, through which the Holy Father opens wide the Church’s treasury of merit, serves to cleanse our souls of sin; to purify us, and make us more receptive to the sanctifying grace of Christ; more well-disposed to receive sacramental graces. For the Church exists in order to sanctify souls and make us holy, worthy dwelling places for the Blessed Trinity who comes to us spiritually through grace and materially through Sacramental signs.
As the Epistle today declares: “Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself will be with them”. So, behold, you and I, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, have been fashioned by grace to become the dwelling of God among us. This awesome truth – that God dwells in human souls through grace – underlies the theology of the church building as a sacred place, and indeed, the existence of the church building itself serves this fundamental Gospel truth. As we hear the Lord declare in today’s Gospel to the sinner Zacchaeus, “Salvation has come to this house… for the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost”. Indeed, salvation has come to us, to our house. For we are not worthy that he, the Lord God, should come under our roof, and yet he desires to, he chooses to, and so he gives himself to us in the Sacraments. So, it is here in the church building that we are reconciled to God, here that we are spiritually nourished on Christ’s Body and Blood, and here that human souls are reborn in the womb of the font, with the Church for their mother, and God for their Father. The dignity and beauty and majesty of the church building, therefore, points to the greatness of the divine activity that takes place within the building, indeed, acting by the Sacraments within the souls of the faithful who gather under its roof. As such, the church building points to the presence of the living God among us, the incarnate Lord who is present in our world and active in our lives to renew and beautify and sanctify all things by the grace of Christ.
Therefore, in the 13th-century, at the time when the Dominican Order was founded and came to England, the Bishop William Durandus wrote his famous treatise about the symbolism of churches, and he reminded us that “whatever things are done here visibly, the same God has done by his invisible power in the soul, which is the true Temple of God: wherein Faith lays the foundation, Hope raises the building, and Charity finishes it. Wherefore, as the church must be dedicated, so the soul must be sanctified… And so Christ, humbled in his Passion, prayed for his disciples and them that should believe, saying ‘Father, sanctify them in Thy truth.’”
From the beginning when Pope Honorius III confirmed the foundation of the Dominican Order, he called the Dominicans to be “champions of the Faith and true lights of the world.” All around us, in the statues and stained glass images in this church which show us Dominican men and women across the centuries, we see examples of those who have lived up to this great call, and who have, by their saintly lives of penance and good works, been sanctified in the truth of Jesus Christ, and who, by their preaching, have laboured for the salvation and sanctification of souls.
This church was built for this sole purpose. Its beauty and grandeur does not point to itself, nor does it serve the vainglory of our Order. Rather, it is here to draw souls to Jesus Christ; to attract our contemporaries to the truth and beauty of the Gospel; to inspire and encourage us sinners in our Christian journey with the example of Our Lady and the Saints, and with the indulgences of Holy Mother Church.
Thus in May 1875, while this church was still under construction, Thomas Walmesley, a pious pilgrim who had a particular devotion to the Rosary and who had encouraged the Dominicans to bravely and boldly build this unique Rosary-inspired church, wrote: This sanctuary “shall be worthy to mark the gratitude of the Catholics of the United Kingdom for the many blessings and graces received through Our Lady of Lourdes” whose principal devotion is the Rosary. “All that is needed to make it so”, he said, “is the devotion of the faithful. Prayers can do more than the architect.”
Thus, on this solemn feast day, and in this 800th anniversary year of the arrival of the Dominican friars in England, I pray that we Dominicans will be worthy preachers and doers of the Truth, worthy custodians of this Marian Shrine. And I pray that many will come here out of love and devotion for Our Lady, and that they will grow in love for her precious gift to St Dominic and our Order: the Most Holy Rosary. For “prayers can do more than the architect”. Indeed, prayers offered in God’s house, here in Mary’s Rosary Shrine, will rebuild our lives, strengthen the foundation of our families and communities, and renew the whole world through grace. Thus the Communion antiphon sings: “My house shall be called the house of prayer, says the Lord, for in it everyone that asks receives, he that seeks shall find, and to him that knocks it shall be opened.”
