Dorothy Day: A worker for the poor and outcast
Dorothy Day once expressed her hope that she would never be proclaimed a saint, believing that if she were, individuals would cease to heed her words. Regardless of whether Day’s wish becomes a reality—at the moment of this writing, the proceedings that might lead to her recognition as a saint seem to be progressing in Rome—fascination with this proponent of a transformative approach to social justice shows no signs of waning. Recently, it has even escalated to the point, though still short of canonization, of naming a Staten Island ferry after her.
Most importantly, as the writers of a recent Day biography note, she was an individual who posed difficult inquiries: “Every assertion she made, every demonstration she participated in, her enduring dismissal of ease and convention, challenges us to consider: What type of world do we genuinely desire to inhabit, and what compromises are we prepared to undertake to realize it?”
Dorothy Day, ca. 1916. Public domain
Early life
Born on Nov. 8, 1897, in Brooklyn Heights, she was christened in an Episcopalian church, yet her parents later expressed no enthusiasm for her spiritual education. Nevertheless, from a young age, she exhibited an innate openness to spiritual matters. After learning about prayer from a Catholic neighbor, she started crafting her own elaborate prayers while she and her younger sister, Della, pretended to be saints — “It was a game for us,” she recounts in her memoir “The Long Loneliness” (HarperOne, $16.99).
Her father was a journalist whose work relocated the family to San Francisco and later to Chicago. It was in Chicago that Day, now a teenager, started exploring the works of authors like Upton Sinclair and Jack London, whose writings ignited her developing social awareness. Even at the age of 15, she noted, she sensed that “God intended for man to be joyful … we shouldn’t have to endure so much poverty and suffering as I observed all around.” While attending the University of Illinois, she became a member of the Socialist Party, deepened her engagement with radical literature, and scoffed at church attendees who showed no desire to contribute to a better society.
