Dorothy Day

Women have had their own numbered as saints for some time now, only they have too often been saints of what I feel is excessive piety. However, Dorothy Day is a saint by activism, and she stands as the equal of any man among the saints.

"What we do is very little. But it is like the little boy with a few loaves and fishes. Christ took that little and increased it. He will do the rest. What we do is so little we may seem to be constantly failing. But so did He fail. He met with apparent failure on the Cross. But unless the seed fall into the earth and die, there is no harvest. And why must we see results? Our work is to sow. Another generation will be reaping the harvest."
—Dorothy Day

Dorothy Day has been declared a Servant of God, the first step to sainthood. Her actual feast day to be is November 29, but I'm moving her up to today to fit in better with the articles I have for this week. Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin co-founded the Catholic Worker movement, and published a newsletter. That newsletter continues to this day. Peter Maurin, a French, working-class, Catholic activist, outlined the beliefs of Catholic Workers in a brief reproduced below.

1. The Catholic Worker believes
in the gentle personalism
of traditional Catholicism.
2. The Catholic Worker believes
in the personal obligation
of looking after
the needs of our brother.
3. The Catholic Worker believes
in the daily practice
of the Works of Mercy.
4. The Catholic Worker believes
in Houses of Hospitality
for the immediate relief
of those who are in need.
5. The Catholic Worker believes
in the establishment
of Farming Communes
where each one works
according to his ability
and gets according to his need.
6. The Catholic Worker believes
in creating a new society
within the shell of the old
with the philosophy of the new,
which is not a new philosophy
but a very old philosophy,
a philosophy so old
that it looks like new.

Day and Maurin were anarchists. Catholic Worker houses were small, non-hierarchical communities. They showed hospitality to all on the margins of society, including undocumented immigrants. Dorothy later worked with Cesar Chavez and the farm workers' movement. As Dorothy said, "The only way to live in any true security is to live so close to the bottom that when you fall you do not have far to drop, you do not have much to lose."

Trinity Stores' site has an elaboration on Dorothy's life, summarized from the book Praying with Dorothy Day by James Allaire and Rosemary Broughton. They state that at the time of the founding of the Catholic Worker newsletter, in 1933, Catholics had been "criticized for a lack of social and political morality." The teachings and actions of the church were not socially conscious. An emphasis on excessive personal piety has long been one of my main criticisms of Roman Catholicism and conservative Evangelicism.

But the Catholic Worker movement instead turns personal piety into a tool for social activism.

We believe this needed personal and social transformation should be pursued by the means Jesus revealed in His sacrificial love. With Christ as our Exemplar, by prayer and communion with His Body and Blood, we strive for practices of

--Nonviolence. "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God." (Matt. 5:9) Only through nonviolent action can a personalist revolution come about, one in which one evil will not be replaced simply by another. Thus, we oppose the deliberate taking of human life for any reason, and see every oppression as blasphemy. Jesus taught us to take suffering upon ourselves rather than inflict it upon others, and He calls us to fight against violence with the spiritual weapons of prayer, fasting and noncooperation with evil. Refusal to pay taxes for war, to register for conscription, to comply with any unjust legislation; participation in nonviolent strikes and boycotts, protests or vigils; withdrawal of support for dominant systems, corporate funding or usurious practices are all excellent means to establish peace.

--The works of mercy (as found in Matt. 25:31-46) are at the heart of the Gospel and they are clear mandates for our response to "the least of our brothers and sisters." Houses of hospitality are centers for learning to do the acts of love, so that the poor can receive what is, in justice, theirs, the second coat in our closet, the spare room in our home, a place at our table. Anything beyond what we immediately need belongs to those who go without.

--Manual labor, in a society that rejects it as undignified and inferior. "Besides inducing cooperation, besides overcoming barriers and establishing the spirit of sister and brotherhood (besides just getting things done), manual labor enables us to use our bodies as well as our hands, our minds." (Dorothy Day) The Benedictine motto Ora et Labora reminds us that the work of human hands is a gift for the edification of the world and the glory of God.

--Voluntary poverty. "The mystery of poverty is that by sharing in it, making ourselves poor in giving to others, we increase our knowledge and belief in love." (Dorothy Day) By embracing voluntary poverty, that is, by casting our lot freely with those whose impoverishment is not a choice, we would ask for the grace to abandon ourselves to the love of God. It would put us on the path to incarnate the Church's "preferential option for the poor."

My sisters and brothers, Dorothy Day is calling everyone who seeks to bring about God's kingdom. The United States proclaims that in the political realm, the Church and State are separate. However, it has failed to separate the State and Business. Those two are not separate, and our State too often operates for the benefit of Business.

Frankly, I am very different from Dorothy Day. I am a capitalist and I believe in the free market for some things, perhaps many things. And yet, her example reminds me that the Church is called to be at the service of the "least of these." At God's table, the poor will sit first. The rich will only get a seat if they relinquish their power and humble themselves (Jesus, I might remind you, instead calls on us to sell all we have and give to the poor).

But too often, the Church has failed to condemn both State and Business when they violate human rights, despoil the environment, and propagate bigotry. The Church has forgotten that the early Christians drew on all those at the margins of society. This is a Church that lives on the margins!

And yet, the Church has been colonized, and it has allowed itself to be an agent of colonialism. Look at how often Christian nations have gone on crusades of empire, at how we today despoil the environment to maintain our lifestyles, at how we abuse and exploit immigrants, at how we treat people of color. A colonized Church cannot truly serve God.

Can the Church be decolonized? Can the Church become an agent of decolonization? Dorothy Day calls us back to our roots, to live with and serve those on the margins. Dorothy Day presents with a vision ... a vision of a Church decolonized.

O God, you made us all unique;
one pattern for each life you found.
Where falling short of your design
you see us, free us
till by love we're bound.

O Christ, you summon into life
our timid faith, our hidden skill.
Where trust or talent are untried,
there tend us. Send us
grace to know your will.

O Holy Spirit, breath of life,
our noblest visions you inspire.
Where hearts are cold or minds are dull,
there shake us. Make us
flames of heaven's fire.

To God, in whom we live and move,
we vow our love and loyalty;
and here ascribe all honour, power
and glory, glory
now and endlessly.

John Bell, Iona Community