On Pilgrimage

Dorothy Day

Jan 1999 · Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing

About this ebook

These diary entries written by Dorothy Day in 1948 provide an intimate look into Day's personal life as well as essential background for understanding the Catholic Worker movement, which she founded. In this book, Day writes about all facets of her life. Yet whether describing her visits to her daughter's farm or the writings of the saints, a common theme emerges, namely, the gifts of God's love and our need to respond to them with personal and social transformation. The concerns of the Catholic Worker movement are no less vital in our day: the disenfranchised poor, the benefits of the meaningful work, the significance of family, the dangers of increasing commercialism and secularism, the decline of moral standards, and the importance of faith. Available for the first time since it was originally published, this edition includes a foreword by Michael O. Garvey and an introduction by Mark and Louise Zwick that gives an overview of Day's early life and her commitment to the Catholic worker movement.

Ratings and reviews

Thought-provoking and full of hope

About the author

Servant of God Dorothy Day (1897-1980) was a pacifist, social commentator, journalist, convert to Catholicism, and cofounder of the Catholic Worker movement. Born in Brooklyn, New York, she was baptized in the Episcopal Church. Day lived her young adult life as a political radical and socialist, sympathizing with anarchists and communists. She was increasingly drawn to Catholicism because she saw it as the Church of immigrants and the poor. After giving birth to her daughter Tamar in 1926, Day converted to Catholicism. Day cofounded the Catholic Worker movement in 1933 with Peter Maurin to live and spread the vision of Catholic social teaching. Day was honored by the University of Notre Dame with the Laetare Medal in 1972. She died in 1980 in New York and her cause for canonization was launched by Cardinal John J. O'Connor, Archbishop of New York, in 1997 on what would have been her one-hundredth birthday.