On behalf of the archdiocese of San Francisco, welcome to mosaic. Have you heard of the order of creatures . They are called the dominican order. Their official name in latin is, the order of preachers. Each wears the latin initials oh each wears the latin initials 0p. After his or her name. Membership in the order includes fryers, nuns, active sisters and affiliated lay dominicans. And its 800 years of existence, it is produce theologians apple officer first. Current membership includes about 5800 dominican fires including 4300 priests. The dominican order has an intimate, enduring relationship with the archdiocese of San Francisco, in service and leadership. The dominicans were here before the archdiocese was. In our original archbishop was a dominican priest. We have two dominican priest serving in the bay area. We will learn about the history and their history in the west and much more. After this brief break, rejoin us to meet the dominicans. Welcome to mosaic. I guess today are two dominican briefs. Let me introduce them to you. On the far end, we have fog father michael hurley. You are the pastor of Saint Dominics parish in San Francisco. And next to him, father james moore. And op after each name. Then you are called the vicar for advancement for the Western Province. Correct. Both local guys from a farming family. Pacifica. On the beautiful western coast. Growing up in the bay area you joined the dominicans in the Western Province. As i mentioned, the history of the dominicans is involved with the archdiocese. Tell me about that. When the dominicans came to california, they wanted to come where the action was. The pope sent two dominicans who had known each other from the Eastern Province and they were working together and he sent one who is the bishop, to start the diocese here. But also sent the first dominican. While he created the diocese in San Francisco, the other said i want to go to the capitol where the action is. At that time in california you had the capitol was in a place called , but misha, california. There was the government. The capitol of california and was also the portal to the gold rush. This is in the 1850s. 1853. Lots of gold coming in and the Carquinez Strait is a better natural bay than our own bay. All the shipping and everything was coming in and the gold miners would go and they would find gold and they had guns because the armory, most of the munitions that were made for the First World War and others from the west coast were made. They looked and they said you have the government and you have gold and you have guns and lets bring in god. It is the original 4g network. You have that sense of bringing god to a place where you have this interaction. And the seat of the archdiocese in San Francisco. It moved from monterey to San Francisco in 1853. The original dominican he became the archbishop, joseph alamein he, who had been in the states as a missionary for 10 or 12 years. We are talking about Mission Territory. Suddenly there are hundreds of thousands of new population in this San Francisco bay area. The dominicans were founded 800 years ago and we were continuing our mission by coming here. And founded as an order of preachers and as a combat to heresy and to live in the faith and bring the faith to the people. Where the gospels were not teach well or not preached at all. It is an interesting name. Order of the preachers. Which we will show , there is a red button that says request a preacher. I almost pushed it but i did not. I understand that for my experience, persuasive apologists of the faith. Persuasive condensers about the importance of truth and beauty and gods presence. Absolutely. One of the things that Saint Dominic did, when he founded the order he said we will be active preachers but contemplative. We would live in small monasteries and we would pray and together and contemplate the beauty and truth and give others the fruits of our contemplation. So desperately needed in these busy and crazy times. You have been in archdiocese for 150 or 160 years from the beginning. There is one parish of dominicans in the area, Saint Dominics church. You as vicar for advancement for the Western Province, how big is the Western Province . It is basically all the west coast of california. And it goes as far east as utah. It goes far south as tucson and across the border in mexico. And as far north as alaska, where we have a new house in alaska and anchorage. We serve the Cathedral Parish in anchorage but go out and act as missionaries throughout the great state of alaska. One of the original party with the archbishop was a dominican sister, right. The wonderful thing about the dominican order is it is not just the priest or the friars preaching , Saint Dominic new in order to radically change culture or bring god to culture, you needed a strong component of women. Even before he formally founds the order of preachers, he founds the nuns first. I had the privilege of visiting the little monastery and you have contemplative nuns living there and they are from all over the world. For me personally it was attractive, it was not simply a group of guys getting together to preach , it was together, we are going together but behind us and supporting us is groups of contemplative nuns , active sisters, which come later. But begin to teach and very much known in this diocese for education. That is what they did. And contemplative nuns active prayer and active sister offer educational healthcare and helping families in need. Was a lot of diseased orphans and so on in San Francisco in the early days and they answered this call. Mother mary who came along with archbishop joseph alemany, she founded the san rafael sisters. The Dominican College in san rafael is from them. And there are still contemplative nuns and active dominican sisters today. Monastery of im not sure. Menlow park. Interesting fact about father michael, he has one of the most unique combinations in the entire dominican order throughout the world which is when the master of the order came to visit he noticed or mentioned to me when i mentioned my sister is a contemplative dominican nun in virginia, we are the only brother and sister that are biologically connected and connected spiritually through the orders. Lets take a break and we will talk more about the dominicans, finding out what their mission and history are. Welcome back to our discussion of the dominican history, mission, and projects in San Francisco. I guess our father james moore, and father michael her already. I wanted to get to this point which is the dominicans are a mission order, reaching, persuading, preaching the gospel. I grew up in the east bay at the tail end of the missionary error of the irish priests and nuns. It seems to me and i will say, we are living in a postchristian society. Secularized world. Are we in a new Mission Territory . Is this what you are addressing in your work . Absolutely. When you look at our culture there are lots of things that the culture proposes ways for happiness. We see happiness in possessions and what we can get. Real estate in San Francisco is outrageous. Families cannot live your and children on are born here. You have a sense of pleasure or a sense of power. Silicon valley and the technology. We are living in times which technologically and perhaps in terms of business and economic is booming, and yet there is a deep spiritual lack or absence. The culture does not have a real response. Response to as Saint Augustine said, our hearts are restless. How do we address that . As preachers preaching the truth and contemplating and giving you the fruits of that contemplation we have been given a great gift of the gospel truth and we want to share with other people to fill that absence we are looking for. The challenge we face, we have been priests almost 12 years now and me almost 11 years. 10 years ago i found the big challenge with the young was, they say i am spiritual but not religious. 10 years later we are finding the generation often the millennials, they say more, i am neither spiritual or religious. There is a great angst. There is nothing. Philosophically, there is a huge whole thing maybe god existed but he deftly has no relevance on my daytoday life. It is a real melee, a big problem to have. We have to know this is the territory we are going into. Has there been an error like this before when god and spiritual things did not matter to the prevailing culture . If you are a student of history you know these things happen in cycles. In terms of losing it and cultures tend to diminish when they are cut off from their spiritual roots, so to speak. Saint dominic, in fact, i think his age and our age has several parallel connections. In that, you have people that would say they have a spiritual tendency or they want to be good people or can recognize virtue , and yet they would reject the institutional church. Seeing the church as the awarding or a barrier to god. As dominicans we see that gods love and the gospel is always that god created everything and crews not just the kind of spiritual relationship that works through the body. God came as man and not only as man but sets up a church, sets up disciples and followers. We see ourselves continuing that apostolic command to preach the gospel. The last thing jesus said was , go preach. We take that very seriously. If that is the last will and testament, we take that to heart and we view are the only religious group that is named not poor who founded us, order of Saint Dominic, the only order that is named for what we do. Op. Order of preachers. It seems to me that the culture we are living in today has weakened families. Weekend community. The most networked culture and yet everyone is alone with his own preferences and his ipad. I am not dissing technology. I say where do we find community . You cannot have a real relationship with an instagram account. It cannot love you back. Have you tried . I am not giving it up. Father michael and i have been friends for too long. You mentioned with young people, you dont run schools, you are preachers and brothers but you do college chaplaincy. A lot of what we do is we set up centers next to secular universities. For two years i was the chaplain at the university of arizona in tucson. It is a state school but we run the Newman Center outside and we have a number of these throughout the west coast. One at stanford. One at unlv, university of utah, university of oregon, university of washington. We do a lot of this with College Age Students and i have been blessed to be working with younger people. My wife is a College Teacher and she is dealing with 18 and 19yearold mines. I have no idea so she tells me stories. How are the kids doing . At Saint Dominics one of our wonderful ministries is that we have a young adult, a strong, young adult presence. We gather once a week. The consistency of young adults who are catholic , to know that you are not alone. Those folks who are catholic in the city feel like they are cut off, not just from others but cut off from others who really believe. That ministry is gathering together and allowing people who are young to give permission to each other, i can move my faith boldly and in a time more politically and religiously, so many ways of dividing us. They pray together and say the rosary together. They gather to have fun together and they played together, if you will. And to be formed together we have talks. This past things they have done, is host this play we had for the parish. They seek to bring the purse together, as well. They are eager to live their faith and they almost need permission. There has to be social life. This goes back to, people feeling disconnected. You cannot have a relationship with an instagram account. People come and they are lonely and new to the city. They may know they are catholic and sometimes they are more robust and sometimes less, they know there is a group of people at Saint Dominics. And they show up and all the sudden , they are formed together. It is pretty incredible. Lets take a brief break and we will talk more with our dominican fathers. Welcome back. We are talking about the dominican order and their local activities. I want to run some slides. Slide one , this is the website of the western dominican province. And this is the province for which father james is the victor for advancement. If you look at this you will see every kind of resource for finding out about the dominicans. A picture of some gentleman that look like our guests today. A wonderful website and easy to find. And the second slide is from the church in San Francisco that is the parish of which father michael is the pastor. It looks like the guys from abbey road. There are some dominicans. This is the most beautiful , catholic website youll ever see. It is the most Beautiful Church in San Francisco, i would say. Amen. Thank you for the slides. Lets talk about this. Any catholic who lives around here has an impression, that Saint Dominics is doing really well and you hear about you get the newsletter from dominicans, we have 20 new vacations this year. The dominican seem to be doing something right. Tell me what is going on. There is the success in our Ministry Sites and we are pushing in places that conventional wisdom says we should not. San francisco is a pretty secular city. We have this fantastic church. Same thing in portland , same thing in seattle, same thing in anchorage and los angeles. And at our University Centers next to the universities. Our ministries are flourishing. It is also reflected in the fact that men are showing up and we are growing. Which is incredible. You think these days we talk about the priesthood shortage and the bad news in the Catholic Church the running priesthood. But there was a lot of good news. Especially vocation numbers being up and men joining. I have had that impression. It is a long course of discernment , vocation training. It is. You are ordaining men. Our retention rate is much higher than it has been since we joined the order and before that , since 1989. Our rates are the highs now they have been. Thanks be to god. Not only are men joining but they are staying. I have this impression, part of your procedure is to live in community. So it is not a parish priest on his own managing six parishes. You have a community of men and a support system. That is attractive. Father michael and i are from strong families. For me one of the big reasons i wanted to join in order that has community be is because i wanted to be a family. You are like brothers. Exactly. Father michael, you are running a big city parish, it im saying, there are no children and the Younger Generation cannot afford to live here, you say we have a Thriving Youth population and young adults group. We do. Come of it froms from the four pillars and we pray together. Right now there are eight novices , their almost 20 men living together doing various ministries but living at the fiery in San Francisco. That is open to the public. You can pray in the morning or in the evening. When people see this group gathered in prayer, they say prayer is happening and how do i be part of that . We study together. There is a sense in which there is a person who will preach on a weekend but all the preachers gather together and we talk about the gospel and we reflect on the gospel. An ancient practice to dig into it. One of us then preaches the gospel but it is as if , the whole community has not reflected and we are preaching together. We live together and we prepare meals together and eat together. One of the most attractive aspects of our parish is not that there are sacraments going on, but the quality of the sacraments, the availability of the sacraments , and the joy of the sacraments, radiates from that living, Dominican Community that is in San Francisco. What a pleasure to have a parish connected. There is beautiful music. The best in San Francisco. And your communications, which is an important part of your modern preaching is wonderful. We have about a minute and a half left. Take some time each of you , what message do you want to leave the catholic viewers with or noncatholic viewers . Live your faith boldly but with joy. We need to be bold about our faith but people should see we are different and we are happy because we have the gospel. Indeed. Jesus says , i have come that my joy might be in you and your joy might be complete , might be full. Our vision at Saint Dominics is to radiate the joy of the gospel and in San Francisco in the heart of the city. When we are joyful, Saint Dominic was the joyful fire. It is infectious. It spreads without being diminished. So we make the boldest witness we can when we are joyful and living as catholics. If a catholic wants to have a great homily during mass or an intellectual experience at his parish, he will stick out a dominican church. The preaching is good and something is good happening. Will be good art and music. No question you are making a great impression. Saint dominic is famous for the rosary. We where the rosary and we have it here and we pray it every day. The blessings of the virgin mary. Thank you for being here. Thank you for telling us all about the dominicans and the archdiocese of San Francisco. We will see you next time. warehouse ambience introducucing togoss nenew french d dip sandwicics featuring fresh arartisan breae piled d high with h tender roasast beef, smsmothered wiwith melty provolone e cheese anand served w with hot auau for dipppping. Try the roroast beef o or pastri french dipips today only a at togos this is the morning edition. A push for more license plate readers in oakland. As the city tries to