Moment of Oneness, June 19, 2024 - Prepared by Rosie Smead

Mystic Moment:  Servant of God Dorothy Day

November 8, 1897 – November 29, 1980

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Meeting ID: 815 0755 1772
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OPENING PRAYER     Prayer for the Canonization of Servant of God Dorothy Day

Loving God, you called your servant Dorothy Day to show us the face of Jesus in the poor and forsaken. By constant practice of the works of mercy, she embraced poverty and witnessed steadfastly to justice and peace. Count her among your saints and lead us all to become friends of the poor ones of the earth, and to recognize you in them. We ask this through our Brother Jesus, bringer of good news to the poor. Amen

VIDEO 1    Life of Dorothy Day   https://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/2014/03/14/february-8-2013-the-life-of-dorothy-day/14669/

Servant of God - Dorothy Day

READING 1   Saint and Troublemaker

“Mystic saints, we are made to believe, lived in the distant past; that is, centuries before we were born, and have been presented to us as near angels, with all blemishes removed. We are not surprised to learn that Saint Wonderbreada of the North Pole, daughter of pious parents, had her first vision when she was four, entered the Nuns Order of the Holy Pallbearers at the age of 11, founded 67 monasteries, received the stigmata when she was 35, and that when she died 20 years later, not only was her cell filled with divine light but the nuns attending her clearly heard the angelic choir.”     Adapted from J. Forest

As we expand the search for contemporary mystics to inspire us, who lived at least part of our lifetime, there is more known about them and less often do they fit the ancient “sanitized” description just read above.  This would apply to Servant of God, Dorothy Day. Persons who knew her and about her are very accessible. When she reaches canonization in the Catholic Church, there is no doubt that she will be the patron saint of the homeless, and also of persons trying to manage an outrageous temper. She said: “We are all called to be saints. Sanctity is merely loving God and your neighbor. It’s not that hard. Sanctity is something ordinary. The scandal is not being a saint.” 

Her basic message reverberates today as it has down through the centuries and was stunningly simple: “We are called by God to love one another as He loves us. Love one another. No exceptions.”

DOROTHY’S INSTRUCTION ON PRAYER:

“Dryness and lack of recollection can be good signs too, you know. God usually gives comfort to weak souls who need encouragement, and when they have progressed somewhat and he thinks they are strong enough to bear it, he permits this dryness. If you are faithful to your morning and evening prayers, and make your morning offering, and carry your rosary in your pocket so that you will remember to say even a part of it every day, you will be getting along fine. If you have to force yourself to pray, those prayers are of far more account with God than any prayers which bring comfort with them. That act of will is very important.”    D.D.               

     

Servant of God Dorothy Day, a staunch supporter of civil rights and an anti-war activist, began her life of "voluntary poverty" on Staten Island. A convert to Catholicism, she was baptized at Our Lady Help of Christians Church in Tottenville, Long Island, in 1927. She has been nominated for sainthood.

VIDEO 2      Don’t Call Me a Saint     https://youtu.be/RKiLCDaCAOU 

   

READING 2

Dorothy Day’s autobiography, “The Long Loneliness” divides her life thus: her first twenty-five years was her period of “Searching” for focus and centering. “Natural Happiness” is her middle period of life, if only the years in her 20’s when she had a common-law marriage, gave birth to daughter Tamar Teresa, converted to Catholicism, and drove forward into a new life purpose. The longest period of her life, called “Love is the Measure” began when she met the French immigrant, a former Catholic Brother and her soulmate, Peter Maurin, and co-founded the Catholic Worker Movement. Here’s a bit more..

Dorothy was the third of five children born to Grace and John Day in Brooklyn Heights, NY. The family bounced around due to John Day’s journalistic career. By the age of 17, Dorothy had completed two years studying journalism at the University of Illinois, then moving back to New York, slipped into a bohemian lifestyle in Greenich Village. As a journalist, Dorothy took jobs writing for several socialist, syndicalist, anarchist and other politically radical activist newspapers. Dorothy connected with folks in the Communist party in her neighborhood, joining them because she passionately believed there must be new ways to move toward social justice for the poor and disenfranchised. In her early 20’s she became an active member of the Communist Party, believing at that time the idea of equalizing material goods so the poor would have their share was a laudable philosophy. Her heart and soul burned for finding a new way to move toward social justice, equal rights and parity for women, and other political issues related to leveling the playing field of life for the poor and marginalized.  

PRAYER 2

Loving God,

Your servant Dorothy Day exemplified the Catholic faith by her conversion,

life of prayer and voluntary poverty, works of mercy, and

witness to the justice and peace of the Gospel.

May her life inspire people

to turn to Christ as their Brother and guide,

to see his face in the world’s poor and to raise their voices for the justice

of the Kin-dom.

We pray that you grant the favors we ask through her intercession

so that her goodness and holiness may be more widely recognized,

and one day the Church may proclaim her Saint. 

We ask this through Jesus our brother.  Amen.

Adapted from the Dorothy Day Guild Prayer

CONTEMPORARIES OF DOROTHY WORKING IN NYC

“Dorothy Day taught me more than all the theologians.” Jesuit Father Daniel Berrigan told The Nation in 2008. “She awakened me to connections I had not thought of or been instructed in—the equation of human misery and poverty with warmaking. She had a basic hope that God created the world with enough for everyone, but there was not enough for everyone and warmaking.”

In a moving portrait of Dorothy Day, written shortly after her death in 1980, Berrigan recalled reading a book about Day and the Catholic Worker not long after he was released from prison in 1972, after serving time for his role with the Catonsville Nine:

"I stayed up all night, unable to put the book aside. What held me in thrall was an absolutely stunning consistency. No to all killing. Invasions, incursions, excusing causes, call of the blood, summons to the bloody flag, casuistic body counts, just wars, necessary wars, religious wars, needful wars, holy wars—into the fury of the murderous crosswinds went her simple word: no."     Postscript: Daniel Berrigan, 1921-2016     By Paul Elie

VIDEO 3       Revolution of the Heart: The Dorothy Day Story        

https://youtu.be/DRQLnJJZnCo 

READING 3

In her 20’s Dorothy met Forster Batterham, a British biologist and anarchist; they had a daughter, “Tamar Teresa,” whom they both treasured. She had Tamar Baptised in a Catholic Church, but Batterham refused to accept her beliefs or to marry, which spurred on her spiritual awakening and her own Baptism in 1927. Her conversion to Catholicism radically changed the focus of her commitment to working with the poor, as her spiritual life blossomed and she felt rooted in her faith.  

Dorothy wrote to and befriended mystic monasatic Thomas Merton. Merton had boarded a train out of New York City for the quiet abbey; Dorothy moved into the slums to live close to the poor she served. Merton had written probably the best-selling autobiography in 300 years, “The Seven Storey Mountain” which of course Dorothy had read. They both had a passion for “restoring the Church to its earliest years of refusal of violence,” and they both return to us periodically stronger, like the perennials in our Spring garden. Pope Francis tapped both of them on the shoulder in his 2015 address to the U.S. Congress, for our role models on the journey. 

We are aware that mystics also seek feminine Divine wisdom; our soul longs for the Holy One as Mother, not the patriarchy of just a Father God. As Western-born seekers, we are able to soak in the beauty as well as the stinging words of Dorothy Day when we understand her life and legacy in our heart, and watch her take the awakening of her spirituality to the community, nation, and world. 

Dorothy Day and St. Mother Teresa of Kolkata

PRAYER 3       A PRAYER OF DOROTHY DAY

Thank God for turtles in backyards,

For smell of horses and the wagon load of celery,

For scrubbed sweet potatoes

Baking in a push cart oven,

For the smell of charcoal on a dull fall day.

For chestnuts, too, and the dry leaves of Bayard St.

For the little bird in the church yard,

Bright with the yellow breast.

For the pert grasshopper on Katie’s vegetable stand,

For babies, for kittens, for little humble things.

Teresa calls dungeons, the dark dark tenements,

But thank God for poverty which drives us from ugliness

To walk in parks, over bridges, or just among the people.

The sky is ours, the wind, the rain.

There is sun on bare branches, and sun on the housetops.

We cannot be home bound, we must look for God’s things,

So to the streets, to the parks, to the bridge, to the rivers, to the markets, to the bay,

Everywhere, even here,

Even in the dungeons

In the ugly cities,

There we thank Thee,

Loved One, God!

MINUTE MEDITATIONS FROM DOROTHY

Please pause after each meditation point for a few moments and apply to your own life.

1.

2.

3. 

4.

5. 

6. 

CLOSING PRAYER    DANCING WITH DOROTHY    (end after 3 min.)

https://youtu.be/q8-z01t905A   

References and Resources

Adeney, F. S. (2015). Women and Christian mission: ways of knowing and doing theology. Pickwick 

Allaire, B. (2019). Dorothy Day and the Great Quake.

Coles, R. (1999). Dorothy Day : a radical devotion. Perseus Books.

Day, D. (1970). Meditations. Paulist Press.

Day, D. (1997). Loaves and fishes. Orbis Books.

Day, D. (2011). The Duty of Delight. Image.

Day, D. (2015). House of Hospitality. Our Sunday Visitor.

Day, D. (2016). Thérèse. Ave Maria Press.

Day, D. (2017). The Reckless Way of Love. Plough Publishing House.

Day, D., & Eichenberg, F. (2017). The long loneliness: the autobiography of the legendary Catholic social activist Dorothy Day. Harperone.

Day, D., Eichenberg, F., & Coles, R. (1952). The long loneliness: the autobiography of the legendary Catholic social activist. Harperone.

Day, D., & Ellsberg, R. (2012). All the way to heaven: the selected letters of Dorothy Day. Image Books.

Day, D., & Ellsberg, R. (2015). Dorothy Day, selected writings: by little and by little. Orbis Books.

Day, D., & Jordan, P. (2002). Dorothy Day : writings from Commonweal. Liturgical Press.

Day, D., Quigley, M., & Garvey, M. (1994). The Dorothy Day Book. Templegate Pub.

Hennessy, K. (2017). Dorothy Day : the world will be saved by beauty : an intimate portrait of my grandmother. Scribner.

Hinson-Hasty, E. L. (2014). Dorothy Day for armchair theologians. Westminster John Knox Press.

Jordan, P. (2016). Hold Nothing Back. Liturgical Press.

Loughery, J. (2021). DOROTHY DAY : Dissenting voice of the American century. Simon & Schuster.

Mayfield, D. L. (2022). UNRULY SAINT : Dorothy Day’s radical vision and its challenge for our times. Broadleaf Books.

McBride, J. M. (2017). Radical discipleship: a liturgical politics of the Gospel. Fortress Press.

Miller, W. D., & Day, D. (1982). Dorothy Day. San Francisco Harper & Row.

Pycior, L. (2020). Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton and the Greatest Commandment. Paulist Press.

Treece, P. (2011). God Will Provide. Paraclete Press.

Forest, Jim. “Servant of God Dorothy Day, Saint and Troublemaker” Portsmouth Institute 2024

https://portsmouthinstitute.org/servant-of-god-dorothy-day-saint-and-troublemaker/ article

McNamara, Robert. "Biography of Dorothy Day, Founder of the Catholic Worker Movement." ThoughtCo, Feb. 16, 2021, https://www.thoughtco.com/dorothy-day-biography-4154465 

QUOTES

Statustownquotes 

Revolution of the Heart: The Dorothy Day Story  https://youtu.be/DRQLnJJZnCo    

Opening Prayer distributed by Claretian Publications, 205 W. Monroe St., Chicago, IL 60606 312-236-7782 ext. 474  editors@uscatholic.org