FRIBOURG, Switzerland -- Dominican Brothers Stefan Ansinger and Alexandre Frezzato are teaching people to sing 800-year-old Gregorian chant through free weekly lessons on their YouTube channel called OPChant.

KRAKOW, Poland – Believed to be the “oldest nun in the world,” Polish Dominican nun Sister Cecylia Maria Roszak has died at the age of 110, the Archdiocese of Krakow has announced.

ROME, Italy – Saturday Pope Francis encouraged Dominicans to persevere in their good works of the last 800 years, which have been like the “salt” and “light” of Christ, spreading the Gospel throughout the world.

ROME, Italy – As the Order of Preachers, better known as the Dominicans, celebrate the 800th anniversary of their founding, they gather in Rome from around the world to reflect on their history, their charism of preaching, and how they can continue to put this charism at the service of the Church today.

When you get to your 800th birthday there’s more than a cake involved. The 800th anniversary of the Dominican order will call the “Hounds of the Lord” (Domini Canes in Latin) to Toronto to study, pray and preach.

TORONTO - There’s no time like the present, except of course the past. Dominican art historian Fr. Marius Zerafa knows the past and refuses to romanticize it.

“Human nature has remained very much as it was in the Old Testament,” he told The Catholic Register in an interview. The golden age of sacred art was never quite so golden as it’s generally portrayed. Even 450 years ago, cardinals and bishops at the Council of Trent worried over the degeneration, immorality and self-indulgence of contemporary art.

Dominicans have a long history of being rather dissatisfied with this world. But they have never merely complained.

Canadian Dominican Father Philippe LeBlanc has complained, but never aimlessly. He pioneered a Dominican presence at the United Nations in Geneva. Beginning in 1996, in partnership with Franciscans International, LeBlanc and a band of Dominicans have been standing up at the United Nations Commission on Human Rights and the Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights to point out where the world has failed, where power and blind arrogance has injured the poor, where dignity has been forgotten.