On August 15, the Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary, nine novices of the Province of St. Joseph professed their simple vows.  Fr. Brian Mulcahy, O.P., the provincial socius, celebrated the Profession Mass.  Below is the text of the homily he preached.

Profession of Simple Vows
St. Gertrude's Church
August 15, 2009

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord. My spirit rejoices in God my Savior; for He has looked with favor on His lowly servant.

The Church, the Bride of Christ, sings forth these words of praise of the Mother of God every evening of every day during Vespers - the Magnificat, Our Lady's Canticle of Praise to God, which we have just listened to in our Gospel, when she gave all the praise and glory to God for the marvels He had done for her in calling her to be the Mother of His only-begotten Son, the Child she now carried beneath her heart, in her womb, conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit.

On an occasion such as this, the Religious Profession of our nine brothers at the conclusion of their Novitiate Year, when they will, in a few short moments, vow themselves to God, and to Blessed Mary, and to Blessed Dominic, and to me, standing in in place of the Master of our Order, Fr Carlos Azpiroz Costa and his successors, our hearts, too, desire to sing forth the praises and wonders of God for all the good things He has done for us. Through their profession, they will take upon themselves, in a formal and public way, all the obligations, duties, and privileges, the joys and the sorrows of the life of a Friar Preacher, of a son of St Dominic, the life they have begun to live during this past year of their lives.

Yet, on an occasion such as this, I suspect that some of us here in this church today, might also be a bit overwhelmed at the enormity of what these nine men, our brothers, are about to do. For the beloved parents and family and friends of our brothers here today, perhaps this is the first time that anyone whom you know and love personally has ever done such a thing; and in this day and age, such an act of radical abandonment might even appear incomprehensible. Why would any young man, as gifted and blessed as these nine are, voluntarily choose to live in chastity, in poverty, and under obedience in this world of ours? That which we do not comprehend, we tend to fear; and those things we fear can arouse anger and resentment within us.

So how can we begin to comprehend, begin to understand what these nine men, our brothers, are about to do through their Profession of the Evangelical Counsels, as they are called, the Vows of Chastity, Poverty, and Obedience? How can we begin to comprehend, so that we, their brothers and sisters in Christ, can support and uphold them today and from this day forward, as they seek the Mercy of God, as they strive to live their lives as Friars Preachers, as heirs to an almost 800 year old patrimony in the Church, as Dominican Preachers for the 21st century?

We have to begin with gratitude, with thanksgiving. Gratitude and thanksgiving for what? For the love we have come to know in Christ Jesus our Lord. The sum of our lives as Christians, as followers of Christ, is a response of gratitude for what God has done for us in the life, death and resurrection of His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. We love God above all things and our neighbor as ourselves; we obey the Commandments and strive to live virtuously; we put our love into action in service of friend and foe alike, for only one reason. Not out of fear; not even out of a desire to please or placate, but out of love, in gratitude for "the surpassing knowledge of my Lord Jesus Christ," as St Paul says in his Letter to the Philippians. He goes on to say, It is not that I have reached it yet, or have already finished my course; but I am racing to grasp the prize if possible, since I have been grasped by Christ Jesus. Brothers, I do not think of myself as having reached the finish line. I give no thought to what lies behind but push on to what is ahead. My entire attention is on the finish line as I run toward the prize to which God calls me -life on high in Christ Jesus. If you want to begin to understand who these nine men are, and why they do what they will do here today, then know this: they are men who have been grasped by Christ, by the love of God that comes to us in Christ Jesus our Lord.

We Dominicans, since the time of St Dominic himself and the first brethren, have traditionally made our Profession of Vows on the Solemnity of the Assumption of our Blessed Mother, body and soul, into heaven, the Feast we celebrate today. Now, we don't always; one can make Profession on a different day, but it is customary for us. In fact, it was twenty-four years ago today, that I myself knelt down in this Church of St Gertrude, to make my First Profession as a member of the very first Novitiate Class here in Madeira. We arrived in August 1984 and made our vows on August 15, 1985. I'm happy to report that my two classmates who made Profession with me that day, Fr Ken Sicard and Fr Matthew Erickson, have also persevered thus far by the grace of God! It is an even greater joy and honor for me to be able to receive the Vows of these our nine brothers this morning, and I am overwhelmed with gratitude to God that we have a Profession class today that is three times larger than my own was, and that there are another eleven just now beginning their novitiate year. God is so good, and He will never be outdone in generosity!

So what does the Mystery we celebrate today, the Assumption of our Blessed Mother into Heaven, have to do with Religious Profession? For some insight, I want to turn to the words of our holy father, Pope Benedict XVI, in speaking about the obedience of the Blessed Virgin Mary. As you will witness in a few short moments, the vow of obedience is the one vow that we Dominicans explicitly make; through our common profession of obedience, we take upon ourselves the other vows of poverty and chastity. On pilgrimage in his native Bavaria, at the Marian shrine of Altötting, our Holy Father spoke of the obedience of the Blessed Virgin Mary to the will of God, and he used an interesting expression to describe the relation of her will to God's will. He said: "At Nazareth (from the moment of the Annunciation, Mary) gave over her will, immersing it in the will of God: ‘I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be done to me according to Thy Word' (Lk 1:38). And this continues to be her fundamental attitude. This is how she teaches us to pray: not by seeking to assert before God our own will and our own desires, however important they may be, however reasonable they might appear to us, but rather to bring them before Him and to let Him decide what He intends to do. From Mary we learn graciousness and readiness to help, but we also learn humility and generosity in accepting God's will, in the confident conviction that, whatever it may be, it will be our, and my own, true good."

Pope Benedict said that the will of the Mother of God was completely, entirely immersed in the will of God. It's that word "immersed" that struck me. When something is immersed - say, in a bucket of water, for instance - it doesn't become one with the water. In that case, we'd be talking more about dissolution, or dissolving, rather than immersion. But our Holy Father said that our Blessed Mother's will was "immersed in the will of God," meaning that it remained her free, human will, and yet it was completely surrounded, completely enveloped by the Will of God. The implication being, in what our Holy Father was saying, that you and I must strive to do the same, to immerse our human wills within the will of God, not in a way that destroys or dissolves our humanity, our personhood, but rather so that we might truly become the persons God intends us to be, in a way that elevates and sanctifies our humanity.

And this act of immersing our own human will in the adorable Will of God is at the heart of the act of Religious Profession. One of the axioms of the philosophy and theology of our Dominican brother, St Thomas Aquinas, which forms the central core of the life of a Dominican friar, is: Gratia perficit naturam, non destrugit. "Grace perfects nature; it does not destroy it." The action of God's grace in our lives does not make us into some thing, someone we were not; no, the action of God's grace in our lives elevates and purifies and sanctifies all that we are as human beings made in the image and likeness of God. The Mystery we celebrate today, the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, body and soul, into Heaven, is, in a certain sense, the goal, the end for which we are striving: the immersion, if you will, of our humanity, like that of the Mother of God, in the Mystery of the Godhead, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Again, listen to the words of our Holy Father, Pope Benedict, when he preached on this Feast back in 2005: "Mary was taken up body and soul into Heaven: there is even room in God for the body. Heaven is no longer a very remote sphere unknown to us. We have a mother in Heaven. And the Mother of God, the Mother of the Son of God, is our Mother. He himself has said so. He made her our Mother when he said to the disciple and to all of us: ‘Behold, your Mother!' We have a Mother in Heaven. Heaven is open, Heaven has a heart." And we must never forget that our Holy Father St Dominic entrusted, from the very first moment, this grand enterprise, the Order of Preachers, to the maternal protection and love of Mary. Ours is a Marian order from the beginning, and each Dominican heart holds fast to the promise that we will one day be gathered within the folds of her mantle.

Now, a brief word directly to you, my dear brothers who are about to make profession as Friars Preachers, lest you be swept up in the greatness and beauty of what you do here today. I want you to keep in mind the words of our Dominican brother, Blessed Raymond of Capua, to his brothers in the houses of strict observance that were set up during Blessed Raymond's efforts to renew and reinvigorate our Order at the end of the fourteenth century. He wrote to them:

"Furthermore, my brothers, I do not want you to be proud on this account nor look down on others who are living in another way. Perhaps they are more pleasing to God than you. We know that while physical training is of some value, devotion is valuable in every way. ... I do not want you think you are better than others, but rather lower than all; esteem yourselves as weak and sickly, in that you have need of the help which others do not need. ... Remember the teaching of the Apostle: If those who are nothing think they are something, they deceive themselves. My brothers, keep away from the beast of boasting and concern for one's reputation, for these destroy and weaken every good work. Ask God to give you a spirit of humility."

A spirit of humility that allows us to say, My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my savior, for He has looked with favor on His lowly servant.