Journeying Together as Dominicans
Life is a journey! Student life is a journey! Religious life is a journey, too, indeed a unique or distinctive journey! Being both students and religious, graduation is quite an experience for us journeying together.
There is a saying, “if you want to walk fast, walk alone. However, if you want to walk far, walk with others.†I am convinced that this saying is particularly suitable for religious life, in which fraternal life is lived in the community. The strength of being in a religious community is to help one another when one is not in the right condition physically, spiritually, or intellectually. There is no room in it for individualistic approaches. He who is a religious community pursues his own interests and projects without being sensitive to others may perhaps achieve them, but he will not find anyone beside him to celebrate it together or to share his joy with.
Celebration never takes place in solitude. It occurs only in the community, as it is a joy to be shared.
As a Dominican, journeying together with one’s own community is something essential because community life is one of the four pillars of Dominican spirituality.  Accomplishing something together with others makes it truly enjoyable and meaningful since such joy is to be shared. That is the case with the group of Dominican brothers who this year graduate after five years of study in USJ.
We give thanks to the Lord for His many blessings bestowed on us throughout these years.
And we thank our fellow Dominicans [and the USJ academic community] with whom we journey together.
Author. Gabriel Kyaw Ko Ko, OP