Dorothy Day on the True Anarchist – UPDATE

Dorothy Day on the True Anarchist – UPDATE November 29, 2011

You only love God as much as you love the person you love the least. — Servant of God, Dorothy Day

It is an awful indictment, but it’s true.

Dorothy Day (“I am an obedient daughter of the church”) died 31 years ago, today. The more confused our world becomes, the more her voice speaks plainly and with clarity. Right now I am reading her diaries, The Duty of Delight (it’s diary entries; I can read a little each night, and that’s all the reading I am managing, lately).

I like this — part of a long entry, it seems to suit the times:

“The true anarchist asks nothing for himself, he is self disciplined, self denying, accepting the Cross, without asking sympathy, without complaint.

The true anarchist loves his brother, according to the new law, ready to die rather than compel his brother to go his totalitarian way, no matter how convinced he may be that his way is the only way.”

I think my son would like that.

Related: To Misunderstand Dorothy Day is to Misunderstand Mercy

UPDATE: Pat Gohn’s Among Women podcast appreciates Dorothy, too


Browse Our Archives