A Radical's Search for Meaning The Story of Dorothy Day

by James Murphy

Dorothy Day was a radical journalist who shocked the conscience of many a patriotic American. She opposed the entry of the US into both world wars and wrote blistering columns about nuclear arms and American foreign policy. But it wasn't just her writing but her acts of nonviolence. She was arrested eight times for marching on picket lines and the FBI had her high on the list of those accused of sedition.

After converting to Catholicism, she initiated a network of dining rooms that provides food and shelter for the poor. Her radical views never changed, however. Her canonization is now in the hands of the Vatican, and those who promote her cause are haunted by the same issues she the blight of homelessness, the sin of racism, the insanity of war, the worship of money, the futility of life without religious faith. Those questions are as relevant today as they were in the last century. If anything more so.

172 pages, Paperback

Published December 18, 2024

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Reviews

[Pranav · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a short book that I got as gift from Nigel. It was a great short book that is basically an overview of Dorothy Day's life. It is not a detailed analysis or biography of her life, there are other books for that. But it's meant as a quick introduction to Dorothy Day. So it was great for what it was. Dorothy Day was somebody who I briefly considered to be my patron saint, tho I didn't because she isn't a saint yet. Tho I hope she will be because St. Dorothy Day rolls off the tongue. I real enjoyed learning about her life and she is an inspiration to me. One interesting fact about her I didn't know was how prayer was a big part of her life that is often looked over or not talked about much. But it was a big part of each day. She is spent at least 2 hours a day praying. She would do the liturgy of the hours and other prayers throughout the day. At the Catholic Worker houses, she made all workers take part in the prayers and mass, whether they were catholic or not. Service + Prayer was combined at the Catholic Worker. Lots of folks overlooked this aspect of her life, but prayer was such a huge part of it. Another interesting fact was she had yearly retreat with a priest named Father Hugo. His homilies were known as extreme in terms of what he expected out of people. He didn't want people to be "chill" with their faith, but to truly do burden hardship with the faith. The faith life should be difficulty and not easy. People truly had to detach from wordily pleasures (Because of Father Hugo, Dorothy gave up smoking two packs a day) Father Hugo way of spiritual life was known as so tough, even the archbishop told him to cool it down or you would scare the faithfully too much. But Dorothy Day loved it and that's why she always brought Father Hugo for the yearly Catholic Worker retreats. She believed faith life was suppose to be extremely difficulty and not easy to burden. Many of Dorothy Day's notes have Father Hugo homilies, so I have to look into them.
Another interesting fact is that Dorothy Day was friends or knew many of the famous communists of the 1920s, like Jack Reed. She worked at the same newspaper The Masses, that Jack Reed did and she even published last newspaper issue of The Masses. She was also great friends with Eugene O Niell and spent a lot of time with him, but wasn't a lover to him. But Dorothy Day was the lover to Lionel Moise, who was Ernest Hemingway newspaper mentor and was a tough guy like Hemingway. So its crazy she knew all these bigger than life characters.

Also I never knew this, but she briefly lived in Oakland and Berekely during the 1900s with ther family and when the giant SF quake hit - she saw first hand the community come together to help their neighbors out. I never knew that, so that was a great fact.

This a great short book that is an overview of Dorothy Day's life. It's short, so that's why I'm giving it 4 stars. But great introduction to Dorothy Day.