Polish Dominicans On Friar!

Via the Corner on National Review, but they linked to it through Novus Ordo Watch being all McGrumpypants against it. I couldn’t figure out how to link “Theartofdisputatio”‘s Tumbler account. So I’m linking straight to YouTube. It’s apparently a vocations skit by the novice friars, because they don’t have all the Dominican gear on.

This is technically speaking a “contrafactum”, or filk, of the Lady Gaga song “Bad Romance.” In fact, it is a contra-culture contrafactum.

You have to turn on the captions, or you’ll be stuck listening to nothing but Polish. It’s a good message.

“O Pe” is how you say “O.P.” in Polish. O.P. stands for Order of Preachers, Ordo Praedicatorum, which is the Latin name for the various Dominican orders. Dominicans sign their name this way: “Magnus Tiny, O.P.” The hand gestures are doggie mouths, because the old pun is that they are Domini canes, “dogs of the Lord.” Preaching is like barking… Hey, it’s the nerd order. What do you expect?

PS. Are those two guys in the middle row twins? Seriously, they’ve got to be related; it can’t just be the glasses and the haircuts….

This one’s a sort of folksong rap about Dominican life and preaching, and the evangelical counsels. They posted the lyrics, so you can run it through Google Translate. I just can’t get over them using a tinwhistle!
Here’s another skit by the same group of friars. I guess it’s a Polish song, and they seem to be acting out various activities. A filk of Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep”, but without lyrics or translation.

Here’s some Polish Franciscans doing a “Waka Waka” skit. It might be one of those “prove to your relatives that you didn’t waste away during the school year” things. Or maybe they’re just copying the Italian Franciscans….

We actually have books of surviving pilgrim songs and dances from some of the big European shrines in the Middle Ages, and every churchyard had dances on saints’ days and Sundays after Mass, back then. Many religious orders back then used dance as a good exercise for the brothers (or sisters) during recreation periods. So let’s not get all McGrumpypants over this stuff, as long as it doesn’t go too far or take over.

About these ads