The Early Days

In the year 911 a child was born into a poor woodcutting family in the South of France. One of 12 children of which only six survived infancy, Dominii spent many a long day toiling beside his father in the forest which surrounded his meagre home.

As he was the 3rd eldest he witnessed the struggle to survive and eventual death of 6 of his siblings. He felt the grief of his mother and pondered on the seeming indifference of his father. He felt the great love that his father had for him and so one day he asked him why he did not seem to care that his children had died.

His father answered that he saw all but one of his own siblings die before they were 10 years old.  He kept asking God why he was so cruel as to take the little ones before they had lived a full life. For many months he asked this same question until one day as he lay asleep under a tree he had a dream.  In that dream a person was speaking to him but he could not see what he looked like.

The person said that God did not take them but that they had chosen to live only a short time to give the other family members the lesson of grief. The person also said that this was not the first time these little ones had lived upon the earth and that it would not be the last time.  He said that this was also the case for himself and all those he knew and that what in one life he sowed in another he would reap. It was up to him whether he sowed good seed or bad and that was the LAW. 

"Who are you to say such fantastic things to me?", he asked in his dream.   With that the man showed himself and Dominii's father woke up with the face of the Christ before him.

He said to Dominii that he knew without a doubt that it was the Christ himself who told him that which did not agree with what the priests teach.  This caused Dominii's father much anguish and eventually he had more such dreams where the Christ spoke to him about such things and they were often in conflict with what the priests taught.  It was this teaching, he said, that allowed him to view the death of a loved one with dispassion. He also told Dominii that not all that the priests taught was wrong, or mistaken as he said the Christ spoke of it.

Dominii's father taught him many spiritual truths as they toiled side by side in the forest. He taught Dominii to revere all that is truth in the teachings of the church and to discard that which was in conflict with the teaching the Christ gave him in his dreams.

When Dominii was 18 years old a terrible sickness came to the village on the edge of the forest where he and his family lived.  Many people died and the sickness spread to Dominii's family.  All of Dominii's family died of this sickness and he barely survived it.  He drew upon the strength of the teaching his father had given him and managed to achieve a certain measure of dispassion but he knew he could not continue to live alone in the forest or even in the village where there was so much grief and distress.

He decided to pack his few clothes, some bedding and food and take to the road in search of a new life.  It was while on this journey that he met Father Cedric, a priest who had started to doubt some of the teachings of the church and was on his way to join a monastery in the hope of regaining his faith.  Dominii decided to join him as he felt drawn to Cedric and as they journeyed he cautiously spoke of some of the things his father had taught him.  Cedric was surprisingly receptive to these truths.

In the Monastery

Dominii was accepted probationally into the monastery under Cedric's recommendation.  Here he found a peace he had not known for a long time and he found that he was suited to the monastic life of devotion to God and service to others.

However, he could not agree with all of the teachings on Christianity that were a part of the everyday devotional life of the monks. After a time he found that he, like his father, had dreams where Cosmic Law was revealed to him.  He kept this to himself for a long time and once he had learned to read and write he secretly wrote of the things he was learning in what he came to refer to as visions.

From time to time he would cautiously mention some of the radical ideas he now had as a result of his visions to Cedric as the two men remained very close.  At first Cedric was fascinated by the things that Dominii spoke of and they had some very stimulating doctrinal discussions.

As Dominii grew in maturity and spirituality he emanated an energy that made the other monks want to be near him and eventually he had quite a personal following.  At first this did not bother Cedric because he too had a large personal following from among the younger monks.  They looked up to him because he had been a priest who celebrated the mass and to them this set him apart as being better than they were.

As Dominii's popularity grew he started to speak more openly about the spiritual truths that came from his visions and even dared to start a small secret group among the younger monks whom he felt confident would be receptive to a change in their belief system.

Cedric became torn in that he resonated to what Dominii was teaching but was afraid of these same teachings because they would be seen as heresy. Added to this was the fact that his personal following was dwindling as more of the younger monks sought out Dominii and left Cedric to himself.  He became very jealous of Dominii.

The Abbot of the monastery soon got wind that something was amiss.   There were too many whispering groups of young monks who would suddenly become silent whenever he or one of the senior monks would approach them.  He also noticed that Cedric was often looking with disapproval at these groups, particularly when Dominii was in one of them.  He had noticed that Cedric no longer seemed to be popular with the young monks and realised that he was probably jealous of Dominii's popularity.   The Abbot decided to take advantage of this and took Cedric aside one day and told him that he had an important mission for him to perform.

Brother Dominii's Downfall

The Abbot spoke to Cedric in a round about manner and of such things that made Cedric afraid for his life if not his soul.  Cedric had never been able to wholeheartedly agree with what Dominii had spoken of to him and yet he had a niggly feeling that what he said was truth.   Now he was confused and it didn't take the Abbot long to have him leaning more towards tradition and away from radical new thoughts.  A few weeks of being under the Abbot's wing had him believing that it was his duty to God to bring Dominii back to the fold.  What he hadn't counted on was the Abbot's idea of bringing Dominii back to the fold for even though he was now jealous of Dominii, he still cared a great deal for him.

Cedric would single Dominii out and talk to him of the traditional teachings of the Church but Dominii would not change from his ideas and became very disappointed in Cedric for his apparent return to traditional thinking.  He had very much enjoyed talking to Cedric about the interpretations of the visions he was having.   He had found ready listeners in some of the younger monks and so began to avoid Cedric.  This seemed to annoy Cedric and added to his jealousy of Dominii. It didn't take the Abbot long to convince Cedric that Dominii had to be removed from the monastery.   Cedric assumed that they would send Dominii away from the monastery with just the clothes on his back and that would be the end of it.  However, the Abbot was concerned at the growing heresy in the countryside and was convinced that Dominii should not be allowed to contaminate anyone with his heresy.

The Abbot's plan was to wall Dominii up in the tiny room that he and Cedric used to go into to talk about Dominii's visions.  He had some trouble convincing Cedric that it was the Christian thing to do but he eventually had him in such fear for his own soul that he agreed to the plan.  The Abbot wanted it done in such a manner that it would be known only to a very few that Dominii was going to be walled up in case the younger monks rebelled and rescued Dominii or warned him in time for him to escape.

Cedric now began to make overtures of friendship to Dominii again and eagerly listened to him speak of his visions.  Dominii was so pleased to have his friend and confidant back and they started to meet in the little room again.

This went on for about a month with Cedric reporting their conversations to the Abbot who became more convinced than ever that he had to get rid of Dominii permanently.  He had now convinced Cedric of this necessity and so it was with a real sense of duty to God that he made his plans.  Cedric became haunted by nightmares of being walled up alive and such was his affection for Dominii that he realised that he would always be haunted if he allowed Dominii to die like that.  Therefore he devised a plan.  He carefully chose two from among the younger monks two who were friendly with Dominii but who seemed not to be supporters of his teachings.  Also they were very big and strong men.  This part was vital to Cedric's plan.

Dominii's Demise

Cedric arranged to meet Dominii in their little room for another of their talks.  When Dominii arrived there appeared to be no one there and just one candle burning on the table.  Before Dominii could pull the chair away from the table the two big monks moved towards him out of the shadows and grabbed him.  One held him while the other one strangled him.  Dominii struggled with all his strength but he was no match for his attackers.  The last thing he saw before losing consciousness was Cedric's face as he stood in the doorway. By the look on Cedric's face he realised that Cedric had betrayed him and Cedric's words, "The reward of heresy is death." were the last words he heard as he slipped into unconsciousness.

Unfortunately for Dominii the one who strangled him did not have his heart in it and after a few hours Dominii regained consciousness to find the candle still giving some light and the door to the room removed and the doorway bricked up.  He screamed for help and tried in vain to push the rough bricks away from the doorway.  It was a narrow cell and he could rest his back on the opposite wall to the door and push with his legs at the bricks but they would not move. He did this till he was exhausted and finally the candle burned out and he was in total darkness.

Then the terror of his fate assailed him and it took all his training in the dispassion that his father taught him of, to keep his sanity. He went form ranting about the injustice of the situation to despair at the betrayal of Cedric whom he thought was his friend.  Then Cedric's words about heresy assailed him.  He thought, "Surely if what my visions taught me was truth then God would not have let this happen to me."  He then doubted the truth of his visions and fell into such great despair that when he died from lack of oxygen and the Light appeared he was convinced that it must be the Devil come to get him because of his heresy and so he refused to enter in.

Dominii spent the next 80 years earthbound in his cell waiting for the Army of the Lord to set him free.  He spent this time in contemplation and searching for spiritual truth.  This time was not wasted but actually served the entity who was Dominii to good purpose because he eventually came to realise that much of what he interpreted from his visions was truth.  He eventually realised that the Light that kept coming to him fairly regularly was from God and he resolved that next time it appeared he would enter in.

However, before this happened there was a great commotion on the other side of the walled up door.  Much to Dominii's surprise the bricks fell away and a very young man appeared in the opening.  Whilst physically he was different, Dominii recognised him as Cedric who had died not long after having Dominii walled up.

Dominii walked straight through Cedric and made his way out into the fresh air.  He stayed awhile in the grounds of the monastery, enjoying the sights and sounds of the outside world.  Then the Light appeared and this time he moved into it.   To his surprise, there was Cedric also entering into the Light.  "How could this be?", he wondered.

Just after Dominii had moved through him some to the bricks from the walled up doorway fell and hit Cedric on the head and he died instantly.  He had fulfilled the reason for that short life, which was to free the soul of Dominii whom he had so cruelly betrayed