The Order of Preachers , also known as the Dominican Order, is a mendicant Catholic religious order founded by the Spanish priest Dominic of Caleruega in France, approved by Pope Honorius III via the Papal bull Religiosam vitam on 22 December 1216. Members of the order, who are referred to as Dominicans, generally carry the letters OP after their names, standing for Ordinis Praedicatorum, meaning of the Order of Preachers. Membership in the order includes friars, nuns, active sisters, and affiliated lay or secular Dominicans . Founded to preach the Gospel and to oppose heresy, the teaching activity of the order and its scholastic organisation placed the Preachers in the forefront of the intellectual life of the Middle Ages. The order is famed for its intellectual tradition, having produced many leading theologians and philosophers. In the year 2013 there were 6,058 Dominican friars, including 4,470 priests. The Dominican Order is headed by the Master of the Order, currently Bruno Cadoré. A number of other names have been used to refer to both the order and its members. In England and other countries the Dominican friars are referred to as Black Friars because of the black cappa or cloak they wear over their white habits. Dominicans were Blackfriars, as opposed to Whitefriars or Greyfriars . They are also distinct from the Augustinian Friars who wear a similar habit. In France, the Dominicans were known as Jacobins because their convent in Paris was attached to the Church of Saint-Jacques, now disappeared, on the way to Saint-Jacques-du-Haut-Pas, which belonged to the Italian Order of Saint James of Altopascio Sanctus Iacobus in Latin. Their identification as Dominicans gave rise to the pun that they were the Domini canes, or Hounds of the Lord.
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