Br. Nicholas Schneider, O.P., on Responsibilities and Stewardship

"As Dominican novices and student brothers we have house jobs, ranging from blue collar cleaning jobs to white collar administrative jobs, and they all support the community in some manner.  You can tell a lot about a particular house job from the title.  Some are traditional, like 'sacristan' and 'guest master'; some are descriptive, like 'third floor cleaner' and 'common room cleaner'; and some have fancy titles, like 'car czar' and 'lavator magnus.' Generally, the fancier the title, the less desirable the job.  Some of these jobs are very public, like baker and those involved with liturgy. Everything gets noticed and you will often be praised or criticized for what you did or failed to do.  However, most jobs don't garner much recognition, except when something goes wrong. No one notices the cleaning and vacuuming of the third floor unless the dust piles up and brothers start writing messages on the furniture.

"In addition to actually assisting in the operation and maintenance of the house, these house jobs provide great lessons in the virtue of stewardship. We are stewards here, not owners, and there are four important aspects of this stewardship.  First, we are given a job by the Student Master and trained by another brother who has previously performed the task.  Second, we are called to perform responsibly and to the best of our ability.  Third, at the end of the semester we pass the job on. In training another brother, we give an account for what we have done.  Fourth, we leave it behind and move on to another responsibility."

In a recent commentary, Brother Nicholas Schneider, O.P., reflected on our call to stewardship in accepting tasks given to us and freely relinquishing those which have passed onto others.

To access Br. Nicholas' complete post, please visit:

Dominicana: House Jobs (2 JUN 15)