Dorothy Day died on November 29, 1980.
And so her feast day is my birthday. On that day in 1980 I was busy at university
with many things…taking the opportunity given to me with little gusto or
gratitude. It was the 80’s. I was, true to my age and the age, steeped in all about me.
I feel that all families should have the conveniences and comforts which
modern living brings and which do simplify life, and give time to read, to study, to think, and to
pray. And to work in the apostolate,
too. But poverty is my vocation, to live
simply and poorly as I can, and never to cease talking and writing of poverty
and destitution. Here and
everywhere. “While there are poor, I am
of them. While men are in prison, I am
not free,” as Debs said and as we often quote.
(From The Dorothy
Day Book, Margaret Quigley and Michael Garvey, eds. Templegate Publishers, Springfield, IL, 1982,
quoted in An Advent Sourcebook, ed.
Thomas J. O’Gorman, Liturgy Training Publications, 1988.)
She attaches such clear purpose to all that modern living brings. My macbook,
my smartphone, my car, my full pantry and fridge and closet…all of this is
understandably valuable only as it gives me time to read and study and think and pray which is the avenue to discovery
of one’s own vocation.
Dorothy Day
Member of the communion
Guide this Advent’s
-reading…
what I
choose to consume
-study…
the
direction of my curious digging
-thinking…
my honest inward
reflection
-prayer…
my longing
for ‘Day style’ clarity of vocation
with a
fearless openness to hear
And make clear my role in the drama of the apostolate
