Searching for the City of God
Catholic Workers in Duluth, Indianapolis, and Rome
“They Will Probably Kick Us Out”
Rome is currently wrapped in bright orange mesh panels and construction tape. Many attractions are blocked off — Bernini’s Baldachino, Michaelangelo’s Pieta, Caravaggio’s Conversion of St. Paul — all for the sake of beautifying the city before the upcoming Jubilee year. Yet while the city repairs its attractions, it ignores a greater issue: its homelessness crisis.
I’m currently in Rome for a 10-day journalism intensive. One of our assignments was interviewing people on the street. My group chose to interview homeless folks we encountered, especially regarding what will happen to them as the city floods with pilgrims for the upcoming Jubilee year.
“We don’t know,” said a man sheltered underneath the colonnade of St. Peter’s. “They will probably kick us out.”
Rome is expecting to welcome 35 million pilgrims to the city in 2025, a 170% increase in traffic from this year’s. Rome’s rent costs have doubled in anticipation. And this will lead even more people to become unhoused in the upcoming year.
Summer temperatures are also on the rise — for the past month that I’ve been here, the thermostat has read above 30 degrees Celsius (90 degrees Fahrenheit).
In the capital city of Roman Catholicism, it is difficult to watch Catholic Social Teaching being ignored. I couldn’t help but wonder: where is the Catholic Worker in Italy?
While there are no Catholic Worker houses in Italy, last August, Day was highlighted at the Meeting for Friendship Amongst Peoples in Rimini, Italy, as a Catholic hero. The event convened the same weekend that the Italian translation of Day’s autobiography was released, entitled “I Found God through His Poor,” with a preface by Pope Francis.
With more Italians (and Catholics all over the world) being introduced to Dorothy Day, couldn’t there soon be a Catholic Worker house in the Eternal City? After all, the beauty of the Church is not found in material goods and art, but in her people: God’s greatest masterpiece.
- Scarlett
P.S. Jerry and Renée have both been present with Martha Hennessy from Maryhouse and Catholic Workers from Chicago, South Bend, and Bloomington, IN at the National Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis this weekend.
Please read this National Catholic Reporter article covering Martha Hennessy’s talk on Friday morning of the Congress—and stay tuned for more stories next week about the Catholic Worker presence and activities at the Congress!
Features
“Everyone Seemed to be in a Hurry”: On Walking in the USA
Tone Lanzillo, of Loaves and Fishes Community in Duluth, shares the second part of his journey to becoming more engaged in climate activism and his own conversion of reforming his lie from one of wastefulness to sustainability. In this piece, he tells the story of his walk from Philadelphia to Washington D.C.:
This walk would give me some time to think about what I wanted to do to address climate change, and if anyone asked why I was traveling on my own two feet for 140 miles, I would ask them if they had any concerns about the environment or climate change. And whether it was talking to a hairdresser, waitress, construction workers, a motorcycle gang or hotel clerk, everyone had a story to share.
The biggest observation that I took away from that walk was that we were becoming more disconnected than ever from each other and the natural world. During that seven-day walk through the back roads and small towns of Pennsylvania and Maryland, I would watch people drive by in their cars but only saw a few people outside taking walks or riding bikes. And everyone seemed to be in a hurry to get somewhere.
Read Tone’s full essay on CatholicWorker.org.
“Think of What We Mean”
Brian Terrell of Strangers and Guests Catholic Worker provided us with a copy of the 1959 pamphlet Two Agitators. We are delighted to make it available on the Catholic Worker website and to share it with readers.
This pamphlet was created by Ammon Hennacy in 1959, with an introduction by Dorothy Day and with illustrations by Ade Bethune. It featured Easy Essays of Peter Maurin's and selections of Hennacy’s writing. Its purpose was clarification of thought, “to make men think,” as Day wrote in her introduction, in a time of great fear and a strong pull toward a unified, homogenized nationalism as the United States continued to be the largest nuclear power on the world stage following World War II, and continued to carry on wars abroad, even while many Americans enjoyed a rising standard of living from the post-war economy.
Day, Hennacy, and the Catholic Worker movement posed questions their fellow Americans might rather ignore:
We believe that we must love our enemies, do good to them that persecute us. We believe that we cannot say we love God and not love our brother. These profoundly simple but serious ideas have made us pacifists and have brought us into courts and jails. During the last five years we have been arrested each year for refusing to take part in the war game of the compulsory civil defense drill. There is no defense against atomic weapons, and we try to call attention to this fact by disobeying what is in effect a foolish law, a law which is not "according to right reason." If this law compelled us to sin everyone would understand our position, But we fall into sin by "little and by little" as St. Paul says, compelling people to take shelter during mock air attacks, and ours is considered a foolish set. But its very folly compels the military, the Civil Defense, the police, the courts, the prison officials, and of course the public, to think of what we mean, what we are saying.
Then too, going to jail is visiting the prisoner, and that is a work of mercy.
One of Peter Maurin’s Easy Essays that is included in the pamphlet felt very timely to one of our summer interns, considering the events of the past week and many of the conversations amongst Catholics (and Christians of all backgrounds) about how to engage in politics as a follower of Christ:
RIGHT OR WRONG
Some people say:
"My country is always right."
Some people say:
"My country is always wrong."
Some people say:
"My country is sometimes right and sometimes wrong,
but my country right or wrong."
To stick up for one's country
when one's country is wrong
does not make the country right.
To stick up for the right
even when the world is wrong
is the only way we know of
to make everything right.
We are delighted to make Two Agitators available on the Catholic Worker website. Read the full pamphlet here.
Roundup
The Catholic Worker Farm in the United Kingdom will hold FarmFest 2024 this coming August. The festival will feature live music and “great food for all tastes and copious amounts of your favorite drinks!” With this event being known for bringing in a quarter of their funding for the year, they aim to raise £10,000 to continue their work in the community. More about the events, such as the lineup and buying tickets, can be found on their website.
The Dorothy Day House in Berkeley, California recently received a donation of lockers from Greener Source. With these lockers, individuals who experience homelessness now have a safe space to store their belongings during the day while utilizing the house’s resources. These resources consist of searching for employment, showering, seeking medical care, working on obtaining documents to get housing, and many more. Read more from Dorothy Day House.
This past spring, Jubilee Kitchen in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania kicked off its campaign to raise $4.5 million to renovate and expand the building. The funds for this project have come from donations and from funding provided at the request of Representative Summer Lee. With this campaign, Jubilee Kitchen hopes to use the extra space to improve services and expand by partnering with community organizations. So far, they have raised $3.76 million. Read more on their website.
Amistad Catholic Worker continues to advocate with the city of New Haven, Connecticut on behalf of their homeless encampment. It remains open after their 180-day permit from the state has expired. Those in the encampment are grateful for the electricity, with one resident telling the New Haven Register: “I think it saved my life. It allowed me to stay with my husband and my dog… I’m able to take my medications for my mental health everyday and I know they’ll be safe.” The city claims that it cannot extend the permit. Amistad Catholic Worker claims it can.
The Duluth (Minnesota) City Council reviewed 10 proposed ordinance amendments targeting non-violent crimes like camping on city property, graffiti, and unlawful airgun possession, making these actions misdemeanors. The meeting was met with an overflowing room of opposition which included Maryn Hakes of Loaves and Fishes Catholic Worker who called the proposals unethical and punitive. These proposed amendments were developed to address repeated offenders and provide resources. The City Council will have a second reading of their proposals at their next meeting on July 29th, with voting being the next step. Read more.
For nearly three years, the Home Office Vigil Prayer Group has prayed outside the Home Office in London for migrants who die trying to reach Europe and the UK from Rwanda. The group includes members from Justice and Peace, the London Catholic Worker, and the London Churches Refugee Fund. The group has found recent hope on July 6th when the new Labour government announced the end to the Rwanda deportation policy, which the group hopes is the first of many. Read more in LaCroix.
Grammy nominee Steven Cade visited St. John of the Cross Catholic Worker House in Cedar Rapids, Iowa on Friday as part of his Giving Guitars tour. On this tour, Cade stops at shelters that offer housing to individuals experiencing homelessness. At each stop, he interacts with residents, donates a guitar, and holds a live performance. So far, Cade has visited 100 organizations in 16 states.
Susan Crane of Redwood City Catholic Worker, CA, currently serving a 7 month sentence at Rohrbach Prison for nuclear disarmament actions at Büchel air base in Germany, has been awarded the David Hartsough Lifetime Individual War Abolisher Award of 2024 by World BEYOND War. Congratulations to Susan and to the other recipients! Read more.
Sister Felista Wanzagi, a volunteer at Wallyhouse Catholic Worker in Honolulu, Hawaii, is on her way to becoming the youngest sister in the Maryknoll Order. She is preparing to make her final vows in the spring. Read more about Sister Wanzagi’s vocational journey at the Hawaii Catholic Herald.
A Few Good Words
On Pilgrimage, Dorothy Day, July 1979
“Diary Notes”
Humid, breathless weather. Little patches of green are pushing out through the cracks in the sidewalk. The sturdy ailanthus tree! My one, large tree, which I can see from my window, just reaches to the third floor of the beautiful old buildings across the street. There are five windows on each floor, arched and pillared and decorated most beautifully, one graystone building between two red brick structures, each six stories high. Beautiful little children live in the graystone building. The fire escapes serve as porches for the little ones.
* * *
Talked to Tina de Aragon Feldman on the phone of Dostoievsky’s The Idiot and Chekhov’s The Three Sisters,and of the cicadas, which come every seventeen years. They’re back this year in the trees at the beach house on Staten Island.
Read the full diary entry and Tina de Aragon’s note on CatholicWorker.org.
Roundtable covers the Catholic Worker Movement. This week’s Roundtable was produced by Renée Roden, Joan Bromberek, Scarlett Ford, and Jerry Windley-Daoust with art by Monica Welch at DovetailInk.
Roundtable is an independent publication not associated with the New York Catholic Worker or The Catholic Worker newspaper. Send inquiries to roundtable@catholicworker.org.
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