Dorothy Day
Great American writers often produce work that does more than entertain their audience. Great American writers have aimed to capture the attention of their respective societies and always make sure their work includes a teaching aspect, one that aims to teach the reader a lesson, usually about life or values. One of these great American writers was Dorothy Day. Dorothy Day was a journalist by trade, as well as a social activist and an upstanding Catholic. Day was raised an agnostic, meaning her family did not practice a religion. However, she attended church services with friends. Dorothy found a sense of passion in the congregational worship of the church, and those close to her said she could have been an excellent preacher of the gospel. However, she felt discouraged by so many people who attended church only on Sunday and thought
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that was the end of their religious obligation to others. Day’s most well-known piece was her autobiography, The Long Loneliness. In The Long Loneliness, Day divides her life chronologically into three distinct sectors: Searching, Natural Happiness, and Love is the Measure. These three slices of her life follow her religious and spiritual evolution. In part one, Day recounts her childhood including her interest in religion and how she came to find credit in radical socialist theories. The Natural Happiness portion of The Long Loneliness discusses her liberal lifestyle, her marriage, and her turn to the Church. The third part of her autobiography tells the story of her experiences as a social activist and a bohemian. It tells of her first novel, called The Eleventh Virgin, published in 1924. Around this time, she married her first husband, Forster Batterham, an anarchist. They delivered a daughter who they named Tamar Teresa, who Dorothy had the child baptized at a Catholic church—a decision that started her process to her spiritual epiphany. In late 1927, she converted to Catholicism. Sometime after, she met a new love interest by the name of Peter Maurin for the first time and began the Catholic Worker Movement. She uses these three distinct sections to correspond with three stages of her life and to enhance the themes of loneliness, self-realization, and love.
“But the final word is love…We cannot love God unless we love each other, and to love we must know each other... We have all known the long loneliness and we have learned that the only solution is love and that love comes with community. (The Long Loneliness 285-86).”
If a reader were looking for a paragraph to perfectly encapsulate all that Dorothy Day believed in, the above quote would be the one. This excerpt is possibly the most profound statement Day makes in her autobiography. All of her experiences in the three stages of her life and her philosophies about God and religion came together to produce this decree, albeit maybe rather idealistic. Her words make deep comments about loneliness, community, and love, three major themes of the book. Dorothy Day was captivated by the idea of love, mostly the love of thy neighbor and the love of God. This is agape, defined by the Oxford dictionary as “the highest form of love, especially brotherly love, charity; the love of God for man and of man for God.” Going over the excerpt again, the reader can note the language Day chooses to use when she speaks about love. In this quote and in the rest of the book Day believes that love is the answer to loneliness. Dorothy Day was also extremely involved in lobbying for the rights of the poor, in addition to founding establishments known as Houses of Hospitality. These are organizations located across the country dedicated to providing food and shelter to those who need it. Dorothy Day was also a leading proponent for other numerous social changes, including improvements in the welfare system, the end of the denigration of the poor, charity by other members of society, and Catholic based social values. Day understands that the impoverished can often feel the loneliest. However, if there is a love for thy neighbor and love for everyone as a child of God (agape), the community can welcome the less fortunate and make them feel loved. “Men are beginning to realize that they are not individuals but persons in society, that man alone is weak and adrift, that he must seek strength in common action” (The Long Loneliness 122). She also believed that “women especially are social beings, who are not content with just husband and family, but must have a community, a group, an exchange with others…we women especially are victims of the long loneliness” (The Long Loneliness 127). This is why Dorothy Day was so involved with the poor, and especially involved with impoverished and battered women. Although she was dealing with the poorest parishioners of the church, she never treated them as charity cases, rather, she always said doing work for the poor was simply doing justice. Day always took pride in treating everyone with the basic dignity afforded them. “Who wanted charity? And it was not just human pride but a strong sense of man’s dignity and worth, and what was due to him in justice, that made me resent, rather than feel proud of so mighty a sum total of Catholic institutions” (The Long Loneliness 84).
There are also a few more themes from the book that are rooted in the core values laid out in the excerpt above.
Day also held a very communal outlook on the church and salvation. She says in The Long Loneliness that “it is the people that matter, not the masses.” This line connects with a line in the excerpt that reads, “We cannot love God unless we love each other, and to love we must know each other” (The Long Loneliness 98). Day takes a stance as a theological author here and makes a claim for the soul. Love and salvation (two of Day’s major themes) are truly fulfilled when the individual is valued before the group, and the soul of an individual is a precious thing, desperately needing to be nurtured with love before it can unlock its true potential. Her desire for the church and religion to focus on the individual go hand in hand with her beliefs about the community. A community can only function when all of the members within that community are functioning for the better of those around them, and it is easier for people to see themselves as a functioning part of a community when they feel comfortable and accepted as an
individual.
Dorothy Day was often considered a radical socialist, but her religious and spiritual piety cannot be questioned. She wanted to spark a kind of revolution of the church. Not a revolution of war but a revolution of the heart, to bring about positive changes within the church and worldwide. As an activist she was able to touch many lives with her work, and as an author she was able to spark question and reform not only within the church but also to those who read her work. Day believed that the salvation of the soul lied in the poor, reminding her followers of the “what you have done for the least of my followers, you have done for me” that Jesus himself preached. The Long Loneliness was an instrumental tool in broadcasting Dorothy Day’s belief to communities worldwide, preaching justice in the form of service, love, and community as the path to salvation of the soul. For these reasons Dorothy Day is remembered as a major spiritual figure of the 20th Century and her legacy will live in forever.
that was the end of their religious obligation to others. Day’s most well-known piece was her autobiography, The Long Loneliness. In The Long Loneliness, Day divides her life chronologically into three distinct sectors: Searching, Natural Happiness, and Love is the Measure. These three slices of her life follow her religious and spiritual evolution. In part one, Day recounts her childhood including her interest in religion and how she came to find credit in radical socialist theories. The Natural Happiness portion of The Long Loneliness discusses her liberal lifestyle, her marriage, and her turn to the Church. The third part of her autobiography tells the story of her experiences as a social activist and a bohemian. It tells of her first novel, called The Eleventh Virgin, published in 1924. Around this time, she married her first husband, Forster Batterham, an anarchist. They delivered a daughter who they named Tamar Teresa, who Dorothy had the child baptized at a Catholic church—a decision that started her process to her spiritual epiphany. In late 1927, she converted to Catholicism. Sometime after, she met a new love interest by the name of Peter Maurin for the first time and began the Catholic Worker Movement. She uses these three distinct sections to correspond with three stages of her life and to enhance the themes of loneliness, self-realization, and love.
“But the final word is love…We cannot love God unless we love each other, and to love we must know each other... We have all known the long loneliness and we have learned that the only solution is love and that love comes with community. (The Long Loneliness 285-86).”
If a reader were looking for a paragraph to perfectly encapsulate all that Dorothy Day believed in, the above quote would be the one. This excerpt is possibly the most profound statement Day makes in her autobiography. All of her experiences in the three stages of her life and her philosophies about God and religion came together to produce this decree, albeit maybe rather idealistic. Her words make deep comments about loneliness, community, and love, three major themes of the book. Dorothy Day was captivated by the idea of love, mostly the love of thy neighbor and the love of God. This is agape, defined by the Oxford dictionary as “the highest form of love, especially brotherly love, charity; the love of God for man and of man for God.” Going over the excerpt again, the reader can note the language Day chooses to use when she speaks about love. In this quote and in the rest of the book Day believes that love is the answer to loneliness. Dorothy Day was also extremely involved in lobbying for the rights of the poor, in addition to founding establishments known as Houses of Hospitality. These are organizations located across the country dedicated to providing food and shelter to those who need it. Dorothy Day was also a leading proponent for other numerous social changes, including improvements in the welfare system, the end of the denigration of the poor, charity by other members of society, and Catholic based social values. Day understands that the impoverished can often feel the loneliest. However, if there is a love for thy neighbor and love for everyone as a child of God (agape), the community can welcome the less fortunate and make them feel loved. “Men are beginning to realize that they are not individuals but persons in society, that man alone is weak and adrift, that he must seek strength in common action” (The Long Loneliness 122). She also believed that “women especially are social beings, who are not content with just husband and family, but must have a community, a group, an exchange with others…we women especially are victims of the long loneliness” (The Long Loneliness 127). This is why Dorothy Day was so involved with the poor, and especially involved with impoverished and battered women. Although she was dealing with the poorest parishioners of the church, she never treated them as charity cases, rather, she always said doing work for the poor was simply doing justice. Day always took pride in treating everyone with the basic dignity afforded them. “Who wanted charity? And it was not just human pride but a strong sense of man’s dignity and worth, and what was due to him in justice, that made me resent, rather than feel proud of so mighty a sum total of Catholic institutions” (The Long Loneliness 84).
There are also a few more themes from the book that are rooted in the core values laid out in the excerpt above.
Day also held a very communal outlook on the church and salvation. She says in The Long Loneliness that “it is the people that matter, not the masses.” This line connects with a line in the excerpt that reads, “We cannot love God unless we love each other, and to love we must know each other” (The Long Loneliness 98). Day takes a stance as a theological author here and makes a claim for the soul. Love and salvation (two of Day’s major themes) are truly fulfilled when the individual is valued before the group, and the soul of an individual is a precious thing, desperately needing to be nurtured with love before it can unlock its true potential. Her desire for the church and religion to focus on the individual go hand in hand with her beliefs about the community. A community can only function when all of the members within that community are functioning for the better of those around them, and it is easier for people to see themselves as a functioning part of a community when they feel comfortable and accepted as an
individual.
Dorothy Day was often considered a radical socialist, but her religious and spiritual piety cannot be questioned. She wanted to spark a kind of revolution of the church. Not a revolution of war but a revolution of the heart, to bring about positive changes within the church and worldwide. As an activist she was able to touch many lives with her work, and as an author she was able to spark question and reform not only within the church but also to those who read her work. Day believed that the salvation of the soul lied in the poor, reminding her followers of the “what you have done for the least of my followers, you have done for me” that Jesus himself preached. The Long Loneliness was an instrumental tool in broadcasting Dorothy Day’s belief to communities worldwide, preaching justice in the form of service, love, and community as the path to salvation of the soul. For these reasons Dorothy Day is remembered as a major spiritual figure of the 20th Century and her legacy will live in forever.