Salt of the Earth: A Celebration of Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker

Social justice news
April 2001

April 18, 2001
Contact: Joel Schorn		FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
	Tel: (312) 236-7782, ext. 854 e-mail: schornj@uscatholic.org

A Celebration of Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker

EVANSTON—Dorothy Day, activist and spokesperson for the poor, voiceless, and afflicted and founder of the Catholic Worker movement, will be honored at an event sponsored by Claretian Publications and Nina Polcyn Moore, a lifelong friend of Day.

The celebration will be held at 2 p.m. on Sunday, May 6, 2001 at St. Nicholas Parish Hall, 1108 Washington, Evanston, IL. Dr. Rosalie Riegle of the Mustard Seed Catholic Worker in Saginaw, MI and editor of Voices from the Catholic Worker will give a talk on Day's life. A video clip from a documentary on Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker will be shown and a discussion will follow.

Dorothy Day received a calling as a young woman to become a Catholic and to devote her life to helping those in need. Day and French immigrant Peter Maurin founded The Catholic Worker newspaper in 1933. It was a radical paper that upheld the Catholic Church's stance on social justice in relation to the abuses plaguing society. Day turned the paper into a movement, which continues today, creating housing for the poor and needy and protesting injustices and violence.

"Dorothy Day's greatest gift was to show us how to see and love Jesus in the poor and the poor in Jesus. She did this both by her heroic example of voluntary poverty—making oneself poor—and by her prophetic criticism of the system that produced the inequalities and injustices she saw around her," says Joel Schorn, Associate Editor at U.S. Catholic magazine, published by the Claretian Missionaries.

The Claretians have long promoted the life and work of Dorothy Day. Since her death in 1980, Day's message of self-sacrifice and justice continues to resonate for individuals and organizations throughout the world.

For More Information:
Salt of the Earth resources on Dorothy Day

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