
Godzdogz
The blog of the Dominican student brothers at Blackfriars, Oxford.
Built on the four pillars of our Dominican life – preaching, prayer, study, and community – Godzdogz offers many resources for exploring the Catholic Faith today.
Read more.
Sacraments: Christ's Gift of the Spirit
Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Pentecost
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
On Saturday evening the community celebrated Pentecost Vigil, and on Sunday the feast continued, with the conventual Mass being followed by a feast to which all the doorkeepers at Blackfriars were invited. Here are some pictures from the two evenings: Read more
Dominican Pilgrimage to Walsingham 2012
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
Last Sunday 20th May, when the Solemnity of the Ascension was observed in England and Wales this year, the annual Dominican pilgrimage to Walsingham took place. Groups came from Cambridge, Leicester, and London as well as Oxford, and after a long bus journey, the pilgrimage began with the solemn Mass in the shrine church, at which the Prior of Cambridge, Fr Martin Ganeri OP, preached the homily. Read more
Sacraments: Marriage
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
Like an apple tree among the trees of the forest is my beloved among the young men. I delight to sit in his shade, and his fruit is sweet to my taste (Song of Songs 2:3).
One of the most beautiful things that can happen to a human being is to love someone and being loved in return. It becomes even much more agreeable when both people choose to spend their lives together forever and to start a family. That is why, since the dawn of time, societies saw marriage as an important institution, not only for their survival, but also for their happiness.
Philippe Béguerie and Claude Ducheneau in their work How to Understand the Sacraments state that “[t]he church did not invent marriage. Marriage existed long before the church. And the first Christians married, like those around them, without needing a special religious ceremony. However, from the beginning marriage was considered important in the Christian community” (1991:137). Nevertheless, Canon 1055 §1 of the Code of Canon Law, tells us that “[t]he matrimonial covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of the whole of life and which is ordered by its nature to the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring, has been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament between the baptized.” And it is “[f]or this reason [that] a valid matrimonial contract cannot exist between the baptized without it being by that fact a sacrament” (CIC 1055 §2).
Canon 1056 tells us that “[t]he essential properties of marriage are unity and indissolubility, which in Christian marriage obtain a special firmness by reason of the sacrament.” The firmness consists in the fact that God is the one to unite the spouses and no one should separate them (Mark 10:9). Thus, one could say that when God created a man and a woman it implied complementarity (Gen 2:18) which is more clearly expressed in the sacrament of matrimony. Thus, marriage, that union between a man and a woman, is part of God’s plan. The Catechism of the Catholic Church thus tells us that “[m]arriage is not a purely human institution despite the many variations it may have undergone through the centuries in different cultures, social structures, and spiritual attitudes. These differences should not cause us to forget its common and permanent characteristics” (CCC 1603).

It is obvious that today the institution of the family suffers a lot. Many people no longer are born in torn families, in many countries children are born in deplorable situations that leave them orphaned, and hundreds of thousands of children grow in separated families or in child-headed households. It becomes even sadder when Christian families choose to end their relationship and opt for a separation. However, Christian families are not immune to the problems that tear down our society.
Where families are torn from the separation of the spouses, the Catechism of the Catholic Church gives us the reason saying that “[e]very man experiences evil around him and within himself. This experience makes itself felt in the relationships between man and woman. Their union has always been threatened by discord, a spirit of domination, infidelity, jealousy, and conflicts that can escalate into hatred and separation. This disorder can manifest itself more or less acutely, and can be more or less overcome according to the circumstances of cultures, eras, and individuals, but it does seem to have a universal character” (CCC 1606). A more compassionate approach towards current problems in families might assist in helping to solve them. It would be an enormous mistake and utterly wrong to start looking at marriage as a less important vocation. It is different from the calling to religious life but it has its own irreplaceable role to play in the building of the kingdom of God. But still, we need to find a solution to this persisting – maybe worsening – crisis in the institution of marriage.
We need to be continuously reminded that, as Herbert Vorgrimler puts it in his book Sacramental Theology, marriage being the symbol of the love of Christ for the Church, “is an ‘enduring sacrament [which] implies this continuing symbolic value and the ongoing state of being Church and building Church.’ From this fact alone results the indissolubility of the marriage of believing Christians and the unity (monogamy) of this marriage, things that cannot be made conclusive with purely rational arguments based on nature. The result of this theological reflection is that marriage – at least a marriage that is deliberately sacramental – cannot be built on a love that is primarily thought of as feeling, emotion, sympathy, or attraction […] love expresses itself not only in the decision made at the beginning, but above all in fidelity” (1992:309 - 310).
Seven Painters at Blackfriars
Saturday, May 12, 2012
As part of Oxfordshire Art Weeks, from Saturday 12th May, and lasting just over a week, there will be an exhibition of paintings entitled, 'Seven Painters at Blackfriars,' in the priory church. The exhibition will be open every day 9am-5.30pm, apart from Sundays, when it is open from 1.15-5.30pm. Some of the paintings are by artists who attend Blackfriars. One of the artists, Louise Sturgis, will be displaying some of her paintings of scenes from the Rosary. Read more
Follow us
Recent posts
- Every Christian should be Poor
- New Podcast: Light from Light
- Book Interview: Dominic White OP and the Theology of the Selfie
- 'Guided by a star, drawn on by Hope' - The Magi at the Epiphany
- Godzdogz Advent Retreat - Preaching
- Advent Retreat - Live Compline and Preaching
- Perspective
- The Lord will build you a house (2 Sam 11:7)
- A Tale of Two Cities
- ‘Behold, I am doing something new’ (Is 43:19)
Tags
- About (29)
- Advent (180)
- Advent Art (9)
- Advent2008 (20)
- Advent2009 (28)
- Advent2010 (20)
- Albert Elias Robertson (50)
- Almsgiving (3)
- Andy Opsahl (8)
- Apostolate (6)
- Areopagus (15)
- Art of the Redemption (10)
- Ascension (3)
- Assisted dying (2)
- A-Z of Paul (28)
- A-Z of the Mass (28)
- Baptism (2)
- Beatitudes (7)
- Bede Mullens (30)
- Biblical Beasts (23)
- Bioethics (2)
- Blackfriars (13)
- Bruno Clifton (1)
- Catherine of Siena (3)
- Catholic Social Teaching (8)
- Chant (12)
- Christ (4)
- Christian Life (22)
- Christmas (15)
- Christmas2009 (9)
- Christmas2010 (10)
- Christmas2011 (2)
- Christmas2012 (3)
- Christmas2013 (1)
- Christmastide (3)
- Christopher Wetzel (7)
- Church around the World (8)
- Comment (8)
- Community (193)
- Compline (3)
- Confession (7)
- Consecrated Life (20)
- Constantinople III (1)
- Conversion of Paul (2)
- Coronavirus (9)
- Corpus Christi (2)
- Councils of Faith (20)
- Creed (47)
- Current Affairs (8)
- Cuthbert Hartley (5)
- Daniel Benedict Rowlands (13)
- Doctors of the Church (7)
- Dominic White (1)
- Dominican History (20)
- Dominican Life (7)
- Dominican Priories (11)
- Dominican Youth Movement (6)
- Dominicans (116)
- Easter (3)
- Easter2010 (2)
- Easter2011 (6)
- Easter2012 (2)
- Easter2013 (11)
- Easter2014 (2)
- Easter2015 (3)
- Easter2016 (2)
- Epiphany (1)
- Eucharist (9)
- Evangelisation (13)
- Faith (15)
- Feasts (39)
- Featured (1)
- Forgiveness (3)
- Friars Passions (12)
- Fruits of Study (12)
- Frying for Friars (1)
- Gabriel Theis (10)
- God Matters (13)
- Gospel Joy (11)
- Gospel Reflection (20)
- Great Dominicans (30)
- Greene anniversary (3)
- Holy Week (20)
- Humility (5)
- Intellectual Life (21)
- Interesting Churches (6)
- interests/hobbies (13)
- Interfaith Dialogue (3)
- Isaac Maria Wharton (6)
- Jean-Baptiste Régis (13)
- John Bernard Church (22)
- John the Baptist (9)
- Jordan Scott (16)
- Joseph (4)
- Joseph Bailham (34)
- Jubilee (5)
- Justice (7)
- Laudato Si (13)
- Lawrence Lew (2)
- Lent (4)
- Lent2007 (47)
- Lent2008 (51)
- Lent2009 (49)
- Lent2010 (50)
- Lent2011 (51)
- Lent2012 (48)
- Lent2013 (46)
- Lent2014 (46)
- Lent2015 (29)
- Life of Virtue (45)
- Litany of Loreto (24)
- Literature (2)
- Liturgy (40)
- Luke Doherty (26)
- Marc Pitson (2)
- Mark Davoren (6)
- Martyrs (5)
- Mary (8)
- Matthew Jarvis (14)
- Mercy (11)
- Ministries Charisms Fruits (24)
- Miscellany (14)
- Music (17)
- Neglected books of the Old Testament (9)
- New Missal (9)
- News (396)
- Nicholas Crowe (1)
- Not Just Theologians (7)
- O Antiphons (24)
- O Lumen Series (9)
- Obedience (3)
- Obituaries (46)
- Old Testament (1)
- Oliver James Keenan OP (9)
- ordinations (2)
- Our Father Series (12)
- Our Lady (22)
- Pablo Rodríguez Jordá (25)
- Papal visit (12)
- Pauline year (26)
- Penance (5)
- Penitential Psalms (2)
- Pentecost (7)
- Pilgrimage (7)
- Podcast (61)
- Pope Benedict XVI (4)
- Pope Francis (13)
- Pope John Paul II (2)
- Popular piety (14)
- Pray4 (6)
- Prayer (123)
- Preaching (528)
- Psalms (13)
- Questions for... (4)
- Quodlibets (5)
- Rafael Jiménez (11)
- Reviews (26)
- Richard Conrad (1)
- Richard J. Ounsworth (2)
- Richard Steenvoorde (5)
- Robert Verrill (1)
- Rosary (29)
- Sacraments Series (15)
- Saints (126)
- Salvation (8)
- Samuel Burke (16)
- Sanctify the Sunday (4)
- Seven Last Words (9)
- Sheep (2)
- Sin (9)
- Spiritual notes (4)
- St Patrick (4)
- St Thomas (6)
- St Thomas Aquinas (9)
- Stations of the Cross (26)
- Stefan Mangnus (7)
- Study (109)
- Thomas Thérèse Mannion (24)
- Timothy Radcliffe (3)
- Toby Lees (40)
- Triduum (4)
- Video (110)
- Vincent Antony Löning (17)
- Vocation (3)
- Vocations (67)
- Vows (6)
- Wednesday Gospel (20)
- What I did in the summer (8)
- What the Rosary means to me (18)
- Women in the OT (23)
- WYD2011 (25)
- Year of Faith (21)
- Year of Mercy (8)
- Year of the priest (26)
- Year of the Word (8)
Liturgical index
- First Sunday of Advent
- Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception
- Second Sunday of Advent
- Third Sunday of Advent (Gaudete Sunday)
- Fourth Sunday of Advent
- Christmas
- Second Sunday of Christmas
- Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
- Feast of the Holy Family
- Baptism of the Lord
- Epiphany
- Feast of the Presentation of the Lord
- Ash Wednesday
- First Sunday of Lent
- Second Sunday of Lent
- Third Sunday of Lent
- Fourth Sunday of Lent (Laetare Sunday)
- Fifth Sunday of Lent
- Palm Sunday of the Passion of the Lord
- Holy Thursday
- Good Friday
- Easter Sunday
- Second Sunday of Easter (Low Sunday)
- Third Sunday of Easter
- Fourth Sunday of Easter
- Fifth Sunday of Easter
- Sixth Sunday of Easter
- The Ascension of the Lord
- Seventh Sunday of Easter
- Pentecost Sunday
- Trinity Sunday
- The Body and Blood of Christ (Corpus Christi)
- Second Sunday of the Year
- Third Sunday of the Year
- Fourth Sunday of the Year
- Fifth Sunday of the Year
- Sixth Sunday of the Year
- Seventh Sunday of the Year
- Eighth Sunday of the Year
- Ninth Sunday of the Year
- Tenth Sunday of the Year
- Eleventh Sunday of the Year
- Twelfth Sunday of the Year
- Thirteenth Sunday of the Year
- Fourteenth Sunday of the Year
- Fifteenth Sunday of the Year
- Sixteenth Sunday of the Year
- Seventeenth Sunday of the Year
- Eighteenth Sunday of the Year
- Nineteenth Sunday of the Year
- Twentieth Sunday of the Year
- Twenty-First Sunday of the Year
- Twenty-Second Sunday of the Year
- Twenty-Third Sunday of the Year
- Twenty-Fourth Sunday of the Year
- Twenty-Fifth Sunday of the Year
- Twenty-Sixth Sunday of the Year
- Twenty-Seventh Sunday of the Year
- Twenty-Eighth Sunday of the Year
- Twenty-Ninth Sunday of the Year
- Thirtieth Sunday of the Year
- Thirty-First Sunday of the Year
- Thirty-Second Sunday of the Year
- Thirty-Third Sunday of the Year
- Solemnity of Christ the King
- Feast of Saint Patrick
- Solemnity of St Joseph
- Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord
- Solemnity of the Birth of St John the Baptist
- Solemnity of Ss Peter and Paul
- Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord
- Solemnity of our Holy Father St Dominic
- Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
- Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross
- Solemnity of All Saints
- Commemoration of all the Faithful Departed
- Feast of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica
- Ordinations, Installations & Professions
Archive
- January 2021 (4)
- December 2020 (4)
- November 2020 (7)
- October 2020 (8)
- September 2020 (3)
- August 2020 (4)
- July 2020 (6)
- June 2020 (7)
- May 2020 (10)
- April 2020 (14)
- March 2020 (11)
- February 2020 (13)
- January 2020 (13)
- December 2019 (17)
- November 2019 (14)
- October 2019 (11)
- September 2019 (3)
- August 2019 (2)
- July 2019 (1)
- June 2019 (6)
- May 2019 (4)
- March 2019 (1)
- February 2019 (2)
- January 2019 (1)
- December 2018 (2)
- November 2018 (3)
- June 2018 (1)
- May 2018 (3)
- April 2018 (4)
- March 2018 (13)
- February 2018 (5)
- January 2018 (3)
- December 2017 (7)
- November 2017 (5)
- October 2017 (4)
- September 2017 (1)
- June 2017 (4)
- May 2017 (5)
- April 2017 (12)
- March 2017 (11)
- February 2017 (10)
- January 2017 (5)
- December 2016 (12)
- November 2016 (10)
- October 2016 (6)
- September 2016 (7)
- August 2016 (6)
- July 2016 (5)
- June 2016 (8)
- May 2016 (10)
- April 2016 (4)
- March 2016 (16)
- February 2016 (10)
- January 2016 (12)
- December 2015 (17)
- November 2015 (24)
- October 2015 (21)
- August 2015 (2)
- July 2015 (5)
- June 2015 (7)
- May 2015 (17)
- April 2015 (7)
- March 2015 (26)
- February 2015 (17)
- January 2015 (5)
- December 2014 (23)
- November 2014 (14)
- October 2014 (22)
- September 2014 (12)
- August 2014 (5)
- July 2014 (14)
- June 2014 (17)
- May 2014 (15)
- April 2014 (28)
- March 2014 (32)
- February 2014 (16)
- January 2014 (14)
- December 2013 (28)
- November 2013 (14)
- October 2013 (11)
- September 2013 (6)
- July 2013 (3)
- June 2013 (9)
- May 2013 (7)
- April 2013 (9)
- March 2013 (33)
- February 2013 (20)
- January 2013 (16)
- December 2012 (16)
- November 2012 (10)
- October 2012 (9)
- September 2012 (9)
- August 2012 (9)
- July 2012 (9)
- June 2012 (10)
- May 2012 (15)
- April 2012 (14)
- March 2012 (37)
- February 2012 (21)
- January 2012 (14)
- December 2011 (34)
- November 2011 (23)
- October 2011 (26)
- September 2011 (19)
- August 2011 (35)
- July 2011 (18)
- June 2011 (23)
- May 2011 (19)
- April 2011 (28)
- March 2011 (42)
- February 2011 (22)
- January 2011 (23)
- December 2010 (34)
- November 2010 (33)
- October 2010 (18)
- September 2010 (29)
- August 2010 (14)
- July 2010 (23)
- June 2010 (14)
- May 2010 (20)
- April 2010 (19)
- March 2010 (38)
- February 2010 (34)
- January 2010 (22)
- December 2009 (40)
- November 2009 (30)
- October 2009 (17)
- September 2009 (18)
- August 2009 (25)
- July 2009 (23)
- June 2009 (11)
- May 2009 (23)
- April 2009 (25)
- March 2009 (39)
- February 2009 (26)
- January 2009 (13)
- December 2008 (27)
- November 2008 (17)
- October 2008 (17)
- September 2008 (9)
- August 2008 (15)
- July 2008 (17)
- June 2008 (12)
- May 2008 (10)
- April 2008 (6)
- March 2008 (30)
- February 2008 (32)
- January 2008 (5)
- December 2007 (33)
- November 2007 (17)
- October 2007 (14)
- September 2007 (11)
- August 2007 (10)
- July 2007 (12)
- June 2007 (9)
- May 2007 (14)
- April 2007 (28)
- March 2007 (32)
- February 2007 (21)
- January 2007 (10)
- December 2006 (30)
- November 2006 (5)