According to Cecilia, as Dominic was praying in the dormitory at Santa Sabina late one night, three women entered. The woman in the center began to sprinkle the sleeping friars with holy water. She explained to Dominic that each evening when they invoked her as the most gracious advocate, she prostrated herself before her Son, asking Him to preserve the Order. The two women who accompanied her were St. Cecilia and St. Catherine of Alexandria. As Dominic continued praying, he saw our Lord with Mary and religious of all the Orders except his own. When our Lord asked him why he was weeping, Dominic explained that none of his Order appeared to be in heaven. The Lord placed His hand on Mary’s shoulder and said, "I have entrusted your Order to my Mother." Then, at Jesus’ request, Mary opened her cloak and Dominic saw many members of his Order. Cecilia reported that the next morning Dominic gave the friars at chapter "a long and very beautiful sermon, exhorting them to love and reverence of the Blessed Virgin Mary." He related his experience, as he did later to Cecilia and the other nuns at San Sisto.¹⁰  While the symbolism of being covered by Mary’s mantle may also be found in the Cistercian tradition,¹¹  what is significant for our purposes is the conviction of Blessed Cecilia, one of the earliest members of the Order, that the Order was personally protected by Mary.

A variant on the account of the sprinkling appears in the Vitae Fratrum or Lives of the Brethren. Thirty-five years after the death of Dominic, the General Chapter at Paris (1256) requested priors to send accounts of any remarkable occurrences to the Master of the Order. These anecdotes were then edited by Gérard de Frachet in the Vitae Fratrum, which was completed before the General Chapter in Strasbourg in 1260. In the Vitae Fratrum, an unnamed friar sees the Virgin sprinkling the sleeping brethren; he is told that Mary has a special love for the Order because all the friars do or say begins and concludes with her praise. She asserts that she has obtained from her Son the guarantee that no member of the order will remain for long in mortal sin.¹²  This account indicates not only an assurance of Mary’s protection of the members of the Order, but also informs us that the friars’ ministry was pervaded by an awareness of Mary.

Gérard de Frachet emphasizes this theme of Mary’s care for the Order in his account of Dominic’s successor, Jordan of Saxony: "Our Master was as devout as possible to blessed Mary, since he knew how watchful she was concerning the development and care of the Order, over which he was in charge with her assistance."¹³  The Vitae Fratrum attributes to Jordan a Marian devotion consisting of five Psalms whose initial letters collectively spelled the name Maria. Each of the Psalms was followed by the Gloria Patri and the Ave Maria with a genuflection.¹⁴ 

¹⁰ "Miracula S. Dominici Romae patrata et a Beata Caecilia romana descripta," in Fontes Selecti Vitae S. Dominici de Guzman, ed. Innocentius Taurisano, O.P. (Roma: Unio Typographica A. Manutio, 1923), 47-48. "Miracles of Saint Dominic," in Saint Dominic: Biographical Documents, ed. Francis C. Lehner, O.P. (Washington, DC: Thomist Press, 1964), 174-176.

¹¹ André Duval, O.P., "La dévotion Mariale dans l’Ordre des Frères Prêcheurs," in Maria: Études sur la Sainte Vierge, ed. Hubert du Manoir, S.J. (8 vols.; Paris: Beauchesne et ses fils, 1952), 2:739.

¹² Gérard de Frachet, Vitae Fratrum Ordinis Praedicatorum necnon Cronica Ordinis, III, xxiv, MOPH, I (Brussels: E. Charpentier & J. Schoonjans, 1896), 119. There is an English version of the Vitae Fratrum. However, as Bede Jarrett, O.P., remarks in the introduction to the 1955 edition: "The manuscript used by Father Conway was not always the best, in fact, it very often gives later and much more detailed versions of the legends, less sober, even at times exaggerated, and almost untheological." Bede Jarrett. O.P., "Introduction," Lives of the Brethren of the Order of Preachers, trans. Placid Conway, O.P. (London: Blackfriars, 1955), xii.

¹³ Gérard de Frachet, Vitae Fratrum, III, xxiii, MOPH, I, 118.

¹⁴ Ibid.