Roman Catholics will observe Monday, Aug. 8, the feast day of Saint Dominic de Guzman (Santo Domingo), the revered founder of the Order of Preachers (Dominicans) and the initiator of the beautiful prayer in honor of the Blessed Mother, the Holy Rosary.
The Santo Domingo Church (National Shrine of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary), on Quezon Avenue, Quezon City will hold a community mass (Misa ng Bayan) on Sunday, Aug. 7, at 4 p.m. A motorcade was held last July 29. Novena masses were offered from July 29 to Aug. 6. Other activities held include mass infant and adult baptism, seminars, mass weddings, and mass confirmation.
At the St. Dominic Parish in Abucay, Bataan, Balanga Bishop Ruperto C. Santos will preside over the concelebrated fiesta mass on Monday, Aug. 8, at 8 a.m. The high mass will be preceded by a procession at 7 a.m. A holy mass will also be held at 5 p.m. to be followed by a solemn procession.
The praying of the holy rosary, novena prayers, and novena masses was offered from July 30 to Aug. 7.
Commemorative masses in honor of St. Dominic will also be celebrated by the Prelature of Batanes Babuyanes, the civil province of Batanes and the Babuyan Island group; and the Diocese of Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya.
Saint Dominic is the patron saint of astronomers and the Dominican Republic. On his feast day, the Church encourages the faithful to offer special prayers to the Blessed Virgin Mary and to recite the Holy Rosary, which the Spanish saint helped promote after it was given to him by the Holy Mother during an apparition in the year 1208.
St. Dominic’s major shrine is the Basilica of San Domenico in Bologna, Italy where he died on Aug. 6, 1221