The Many Miracles of Bethany House of Hospitality
Plus: Los Angeles CW files brief in Supreme Court homelessness case; Fordham CW students vigil at St. Patrick's Cathedral; and Dorothy on giving thanks to God.
Breaking through Fear with Love
On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court spent more than two hours questioning lawyers about whether someone who doesn’t have access to shelter can sleep in outdoor public spaces with a blanket. For many Roundtable readers, the answer probably seems obvious: If you don’t have anywhere else to sleep, then of course you need to sleep outside—and you have a right to protect yourself from the elements with a blanket, or a pillow, or even a tent. The command from the Book of Exodus might come to mind:
If you take your neighbor’s cloak as a pledge, you shall return it to him before sunset; for this is his only covering; it is the cloak for his body. What will he sleep in? If he cries out to me, I will listen; for I am compassionate.
The Catholic Worker has a long history of tangling with policymakers who attempt to criminalize poverty, and for numerous CW communities, the question raised in Grants Pass v. Johnson is increasingly a flash point. That’s why our lead story is about the amicus brief that the Los Angeles Catholic Worker filed in the case—and why Roundtable will be following up with more reporting on this issue.
The lawyer arguing on behalf of the city kept describing the homelessness issue as “complicated.” That may be true for government policymakers—but then you read the story of how Michael Horank opened a Catholic Worker for people infected with HIV/AIDs in the 1990s, and you think, is this really all that complicated?
In his interview with student journalist Julia Sommerfield, Horank gives us a tantalizing glimpse of that "better world”—the one where it is easier to be good—that the Catholic Worker aims for. “Don’t be afraid,” he tells Julia; the only way to break through stigma and fear is with love.
The interview is so good that we’re running it in its entirety in this newsletter.
The learned men and women at the Supreme Court did a lot of straining out gnats and weighing dill, mint, and cumin on Monday. If only they had heard Michael’s story, so full of real wisdom and light, things might not have seemed so complicated.
Jerry
FEATURED
Supreme Court Poised to Uphold Bans on Sleeping in Public
With at least 250,000 homeless people sleeping in unsheltered locations across the United States, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday took up the question of whether cities can criminalize that status. The Los Angeles Catholic Worker (LACW) was among 68 parties that filed a “friend of the court” brief in the case, City of Grants Pass v. Gloria Johnson, et al.
The court will decide whether or not to uphold an ordinance in the small town of Grants Pass, Oregon, which bans camping on public land. The city has used the ordinance to prohibit the unhoused from sleeping in city parks or on sidewalks. Three unhoused people challenged the ordinance, which was subsequently struck down by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on the grounds that it violated the Eighth Amendment clause prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment.
In their “friend of the court” brief, lawyers for the LACW argue that the Supreme Court should uphold that decision, writing that “criminalizing basic life activities for the unsheltered” violates the Constitution, as the unsheltered often have no other place to go.
The court heard the case as municipalities across the country struggle to reckon with the rising number of unsheltered sleeping on America’s streets. City governments contend they need laws like the one in Grants Pass to protect the unsheltered from dangerous and unhealthy conditions in tent encampments.
But in the amicus curiae brief, lawyers for the LACW argue that Los Angeles has failed to provide enough beds for the more than 46,000 people experiencing homelessness in the city of Los Angeles. A ruling upholding the Grants Pass ordinance would effectively criminalize these people’s very existence.
The Eighth Amendment places “substantive limits on what can be made criminal and punished as such,” the LACW brief says, arguing that the Grants Pass ordinance violates the cruel and unusual punishment clause because by criminalizing the activities needed for survival (sleeping with a blanket on a cold night, for example), the law is punishing people for the condition of being without shelter—a condition they cannot easily change.
“In the face of daily criminalization of essential life activities, unhoused individuals will continue to pay the repercussions for circumstances that are beyond their control, meaning they will have to weigh survival or a restriction of their freedom,” the brief says.
Court watchers say that on the basis of the justices’ questions and comments during Monday’s two and a half hours of arguments, the Court seems likely to uphold the Grants Pass ordinance.
The court’s liberal justices asked questions probing whether the legal framework being discussed should view homelessness as a status, akin to addiction in Robinson v. California, where the Court ruled it unconstitutional to criminalize the status of being addicted to narcotics. The liberal justices suggested that the status of being unsheltered necessitates sleeping outside.
“It's sort of like breathing,” Justice Elana Kagen said. “I mean, you could say breathing is conduct too, but, presumably, you would not think that it's okay to criminalize breathing in public.”
But conservative justices pushed back on that argument. “How about if there are no public bathroom facilities?" asked Justice Neil Gorsuch. "Do people have an Eighth Amendment right to defecate and urinate? Is that conduct or is that status?"
“What’s so complicated about letting someone somewhere sleep with a blanket in the outside if they have nowhere to sleep?” countered Justice Sonia Sotomayor. “The laws against defecation, the laws against keeping things unsanitary around yourself, those have all been upheld.”
Sotomayor also speculated about the consequences of upholding the Grants Pass ordinance. “Where do we put them if every city, every village, every town lacks compassion and passes a law identical to this? Where are they supposed to sleep? Are they supposed to kill themselves, not sleeping?”
Catholic Worker communities have a long history of contending with state criminalization of poverty. In January, House of Hagar Catholic Worker prevailed in a legal battle with the city of Wheeling, West Virginia, over a similar anti-camping ordinance. In New Haven, Connecticut, Amistad Catholic Worker responded to the city’s clearing of a homeless encampment by allowing unhoused people to move into its backyard.
You can read the full LACW amicus brief here, a transcript of the oral arguments before the Supreme Court here. You can read analysis of the oral arguments at SCOTUS blog, the New York Times, and NPR.
Breaking Through Fear with Love: Remembering the HIV/AIDS Ministry at Oakland’s Bethany House
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When Michael Horank arrived in Oakland, California, in 1988, AIDS was ravaging the gay community. At the time, the disease was a death sentence, and people infected with HIV/AIDS were often shunned out of fear.
Horank came to Oakland to work as a nurse with the AIDS Minority Health Initiative. As a Christian and a Catholic Worker, he soon felt called to do something more.
“I called myself a Christian and a follower of the teachings of Jesus,” he recently told Mercer Island High School senior Julia Sommerfield in an interview she did for the student-run FM radio station. “And if you're serious about wanting to be a disciple or a follower of Jesus of Nazareth…you clearly see that Jesus was a friend of the poor, of the marginalized, of the ostracized.”
As a gay man himself, it seemed obvious that people with HIV/AIDS were poor, marginalized, and ostracized.
“I prayed that God would open up an opportunity for me to address the needs of people with HIV and AIDS who were dying, and voila, God opened up that possibility,” he said.
After opening Bethany House of Hospitality, Horank and a circle of volunteers spent the next nine years working to break through the fear and stigma of AIDS with love. Along the way, he participated in an underground clinic and witnessed more than one Lazarus-style “resurrection.”
Here’s that interview, lightly edited for clarity. If you prefer, you can listen at CatholicWorker.org.
Julia Sommerfield: You're listening to 88.9 The Bridge. I'm Julia Sommerfield, and what you're about to hear is a ve How are you doing How bad ry special interview with Michael Horank. Michael Horank worked at Bethany House from 1990 till 1999.
Though Horank has helped many people throughout his time as a nurse, Bethany House was where he made his greatest impact. Here he helped homeless men, women, and children with HIV/AIDS, making a difference not just in their lives, but in the world today.
Michael Horank: Hi, everyone. I'm still working as a nurse. I'm 71 years old in May, and I've been a nurse now for 37 years. So, when I arrived in California in 1988, after graduating from nursing school, I got a job as a nurse with the AIDS Minority Health Initiative here in Oakland, the first Black community-based organization that worked with people of color.
And during the year and a half that I worked as a nurse there, I discovered that there was no residential hospice here in the East Bay. San Francisco had four of them. And of course, this was a time when people were dying from AIDS because there wasn't a lot of treatment and there was no cure.
There's still no cure, but there wasn't a lot of treatment. So, people were dying by the thousands, the tens of thousands throughout the world. So, I visited and worked with mainly African-American families and men and some women.
And I decided, well, there's no residential hospice, a place where people can come and die with dignity and comfort. So, a religious order agreed, the Redemptorist Fathers and Brothers agreed to rent me this house. Actually, we didn't have to pay rent because it was originally supposed to be for priests with AIDS, but no one ever showed up.
No priest, after a year and spending thousands of dollars renovating the house, no priest ever came to take up residence there. And understandably, because they were very fearful. So I asked the Redemptorist Fathers and Brothers if I could use it as a Catholic Worker house for what one novelist called the first children of the church, and that is the poor.
And so, they agreed to that. And so, in 1990, within a week, even though the house had been empty for a year, I had three guests at the house.
Julia Sommerfield: Was that Bethany House? Did you start?
Michael Horank: Yes, that was Bethany House. I started Bethany House as a Catholic Worker house of hospitality. We didn't call it a hospice because of the connotation of that word.
I didn't want it to be a place where people thought they came to die. I wanted them to come to live before they died and not just survive. Because when you're homeless, you're living in a survival mode, necessarily.
And I wanted them to truly choose to live before they died. So, I didn't call it a hospice. It was called Bethany House of Hospitality because Bethany was the hometown in Judea of Jesus's close friends, Mary, Martha, and Lazarus.
So, it was also the home, the place where Jesus resurrected Lazarus from the dead and gave him new life, a miracle that changed everyone's life in that village and in the world.
Julia Sommerfield: When you started working there, how many people did you initially have working with you? Were you kind of running the thing on your own or did you get more volunteers over time?
Michael Horank: I was connected with one of the Holy Spirit Parish in Berkeley, California. And when I announced that the house would be opened and requested volunteers, people came eventually, within six months, to help out. And our first guest actually was only there for about three months before he died, an African-American man named AJ.
And eventually there became a whole circle and community of volunteers who would help drive people to their doctor's offices, who would cook food, who would accompany people when they were in the dying process so that nobody was left alone when they were actively dying. And they would help also with gardening. We had a garden in the backyard.
It was a three-bedroom house, a ranch-like house with lots of trees in the background and a creek in the backyard that you could hear when the water was flowing. So, it was a very beautiful place surrounded by nature. So, yeah.
Julia Sommerfield: Sounds really pretty. Who were some of the first patients that came in? Were there any that when you met them, you felt some sort of impact either within yourself or towards them or that you just remember really distinctly?
Michael Horank: One of our first guests was a man named Henry who was in his 30s at the time. He had been a Vietnam veteran with shrapnel still in his knee. And he had been involved with drugs and the BDS community, the sex community in San Francisco.
But when he came down with the diagnosis of AIDS, there was no place for him to turn to. He was in the hospital and none of his friends in that so-called community came to his aid. And I received a call from the hospital saying that he needed a place to stay, that he was homeless.
So, I took Henry in. And Henry was actually our longest guest. He'd lived for three and a half years and on the treatment that he was on.
When he first came, of course, when everyone first came, they sort of couldn't believe that this was a safe place. They didn't have to fill out any applications. For the invitation, I would say, well, yeah, the application is come have dinner with us or lunch and see if this is a good place for you.
And that happened. And eventually, Henry went through in that three and a half years, a very radical transformation where he went from just surviving, as he had to do when he didn't have any place to stay. He didn't have any family.
And he eventually opened up. He was full of fear and suspicion and distrust. And eventually, when he really learned that this was a space for him to truly live and to begin again, the life adventure of trust and vulnerability, he really transformed himself by making himself available to therapy, to massage…there were volunteers that gave massages…and to a wider community, he was a frequent visitor to the Center for AIDS in Oakland, which was started by Mother Teresa's brothers. It was a day center.
So, he made wonderful connections with them and felt a value and a self-worth that he had never felt before. And when he died, he had made arrangements to have his friends with him when he died. And he even picked out the music.
And he had a devotion to Native American spirituality. And he made this incredible outfit with his own sewing machine, he did this, it was amazing.
And he made a complete outfit, including the headdress, and wrote out the Our Father prayer in Lakota, in the Lakota language. And he requested that we say that prayer, but also requested when he was dying, and actively dying, he wanted a Gregorian chant, the Kyrie Eleison, which means in Greek, “Lord, have mercy,” to be playing.
And that's what happened. He died, the chant in his room, and incense, and his friends, including myself, surrounding him, and he died a very peaceful death.
Julia Sommerfield: Did you work in taking care of patients? Or did you just run the whole house as you were the one who founded it?
Michael Horank: Yeah, it depended upon what their needs were. Henry lasted three and a half years. Our shortest guest was there for eight days.
And he was in bed most of the time. So he had to be cared for, bathed, and fed. He was there for eight days.
So, there were various nursing activities that I was able to do, but not restricted to the nursing. I cooked, I cleaned, I took people to the doctors, and therapists, and the AIDS center. You have to be flexible. Yeah.
Julia Summerfield: How many people were living in the house at a time? Because you said it had about three bedrooms.
Michael Horank: There were three people at a time living at the house. They each had their own room. There were big bedrooms.
And people said, “Well, why don't you double up? Because there's lots of people who need the service.” And I said, “Look, when you're sick like that, you need your own space to be able to live, to become aware of what your needs are, and not to be bothered by other people's needs who were also dying.”
Even though people were very kind to one another in the house, people had their own rooms. And that was their sacred space. Many of them had never had their own rooms.
So, to be able to have that space in which to really enter into a new possibility, the possibilities of truly living before you died, then that was helpful to people.
Julia Sommerfield: Do you know how many people over the time that you were working there ended up living in the house?
Michael Horank: Yeah. Over those years, nine years, there was about 30 people that came through the house. And they all died except for the last two.
Because by that time, in 1996, the medicine for AIDS, the treatment for AIDS, they were called protease inhibitors, came out. And that really did save people from dying, most people from dying. And so, when those medicines became available, people didn't stop dying, but people were able to live with those medicines.
So that was a real radical change that happened in 1997. Yeah.
Julia Sommerfield: I wasn't alive at that time, so I don't know. I know what I've read, learned about, but they teach a lot of stuff in school, at least from what I've gone through about AIDS and HIV and kind of how that looked like for people. What was it like in that time when it was more new and scary? And there was just so much, I know, a lot of fear and hesitation.
Michael Horank: There was a lot of fear, a lot of stigma, and a lot of shame that people had. And that was sad. Even among hospital healthcare workers, there was a lot of fear and a lot of stigma.
Because you were dealing with a group of people who were identified as gay, addicted to drugs, drug users, and it was terrible, the fear that people had of these folks. And how do you break through that fear? And how do you break through that stigma?
You break through it with love. That's the only cure for those very human and deeply human fears that we have as human beings when we're confronted with infectious or contagious diseases. But you don't define people by their disease.
If you do, then you're missing out on the other parts of their humanity.
Julia Sommerfield: What drew you towards that work? Because I guess you had to be a person who went beyond the fear and stereotypes and what people were labeling those with AIDS and HIV as. What called you to do that work?
Michael Horank: I felt a vocation to do this work because I called myself a Christian and a follower of the teachings of Jesus. And if you're serious about wanting to be a disciple or a follower of Jesus of Nazareth, then you look at the life and the teachings that Jesus had, that Jesus lived, and you clearly see that Jesus was a friend of the poor, of the marginalized, of the ostracized during the time that he lived. Well, I asked, who are the people that are ostracized and marginalized and stigmatized?
And for me, because I'm a gay man myself, I was able to see that the people who were suffering from HIV and AIDS, the majority were the people during that time who were marginalized and who were ostracized and who were stigmatized. And so the call to create a space of healing and justice and love, most of all love, was a calling that I felt very deeply after I graduated from nursing school, because I had previously worked with people with cancer in New York City when I was at the Catholic Worker, and that was my first experience as a nursing assistant. And then eventually, I went to nursing school and graduated in 1987, came to California in 1988, and then I felt a vocation to work with people with HIV and AIDS, but especially people who are homeless.
That was the motivation. It's my Christian faith that gave me a sense of vocation to do the work and to not wait for somebody else to be doing it. I saw the need. The need was desperate here in the East Bay, and decided, okay, I prayed that God would open up an opportunity for me to address the needs of people with HIV and AIDS who were dying, and voila, God opened up that possibility.
And it was scary to think, “Can I do this?” But I mean, for me, God gives to us what we need when we do the work of God, which is the work of love and justice.
I never worried about money. We were all volunteers. None of us got paid for doing the work, including myself, because that's part of the Catholic Worker philosophy, is that you live simply and in voluntary poverty to be able to share the gifts that you have with other people.
The house was financed by private donations, and we published a newsletter a couple of times a year. Sometimes the guests would write for the newsletter, and it was really quite beautiful. They would write about their experience at Bethany House.
Julia Sommerfield: You said it was scary for you. What was some of the hardest or scariest things about working or just general struggles that you had trying to build Bethany House up?
Michael Horank: Well, it wasn't scary. That might have been not a good word to use.
I mean, there were fears. As a healthcare worker, there were fears of infection, of contagion. Even though I knew that HIV is not easily spread, during the early years, people didn't know that. But a needle stick as a nurse, if you get a needle stick, you could get infected.
Working in the hospitals or giving injections to people, that could happen, and it did happen to healthcare workers. So that was one of the fears, but that never happened. You just have to overcome the fears with trust.
You have to accept that maybe even if this does happen, even if I got infected through a needle stick, I would still be able to be treated. That's the principal fear. Of course, other healthcare workers shared with me that they had nightmares about being infected, but that was the chief fear about being infected.
Julia Sommerfield: What were the treatments at the time or just some idea of what they were like? I know you guys were primarily making people comfortable, it sounds like, but what was some of the medical treatment?
Michael Horank: Well, Bethany House also participated in an underground clinic. There was a medication from China that was called Tricosanthin or Compound Q. Because there was very few treatments, people were willing to risk doing treatments.
This organization called Project Inform, which educated people about treatments, decided that they would sponsor several clinics around the country where patients would infuse Tricosanthin or Compound Q via IV. We had to do that underground because we didn't have the money to do official clinical studies. It was an immune booster, this medication, so people organized, and there were clinics in New York and San Francisco and Houston and Boston. And in our house at Bethany, we participated in that and I participated as a nurse. Once a month, patients would come and they would get infused through the IV with this medication.
About a third of the patients who received it had a very, very good response. A third were stable and about a third, it didn't work for them. So, this was a very radical thing to do because the doctors and nurses that were starting the IVs and participating in this clinical experiment, we could have lost our licenses very easily because we weren't officially following the law.
So that was one treatment and there were other treatments. People turned to herbal treatments, people turned to homeopathic treatments, people turned to lots of different treatments if they could afford it. The clinical studies for Compound Q that Bethany House and I as a nurse participated in, that drug was very expensive.
So, when the organizers of these clinics asked me to participate, I said, yes, I'll be willing to do that as long as you allow two or three people who can't afford it that they be allowed to receive the treatment. And they agreed to that. It was really wonderful that there were a couple of people who were able to get the treatment.
Julia Sommerfield: And so you were giving people treatment and helping out. What did you take after you left Bethany House? What did you take out of that? And then Bethany House, does it continue to run under doing something else or still what it started as?
Michael Horank: No, I was very deeply moved and grateful for the opportunity to create a healing space for people to truly live before they died. And the most dramatic example of that was a 29-year-old African-American man who was deaf and mute. His name was Damon.
And he came to the house in a wheelchair bent over and his face hidden by a hoodie. And I didn't know whether or not I could care for him because I didn't know sign language. And he was in very bad shape.
I didn't expect him to live very long at all. But the first week that he was at the house, we were eating lunch in the kitchenette and I had hummingbird feeders at the window and a hummingbird came to the window. And previous to that, we were writing out everything because I didn't know sign language.
And suddenly he looked at one of the hummingbirds that came to the feeder and all of a sudden he said, hummingbird. And I went, “Oh my God! You can talk!” And he said, “Yeah.”
And it was like a miracle. And I said, “How come you haven't talked before, haven't talked with me?” And he said, “Because people make fun of me and the way I talk,” the way in which deaf people have, when they vocalize. And I was like, wow. He was reading my lips at the time.
And I said, “Damon, nobody will make fun of you ever again here in this house. And if they do, you speak to me and we'll take care of it.” Well, after that moment, he didn't shut up.
He was just talking constantly, but he would only speak in the house. And after about a week, he would get daily massages because his skin was flaking off and he was losing weight….
He lived for three months. And during that three months, he gained 30 pounds and was walking around, going to the video store with us to get videos. We got him hearing aids, and he just resurrected.
He completely resurrected. I used to ask people what they wanted to do, if there was some wish they had before they died. And Damon said that he wanted to ride the rollercoaster and Santa Cruz and the boardwalk.
And believe it or not, his father, who he had been alienated from, came down from Washington state where he had just graduated with a degree in counseling, addiction counseling. And he came down and he went with Damon down to Santa Cruz. He rode the rollercoaster.
They used the house car because his father was poor and didn't have any money. And he came back and he told me all about riding the rollercoaster. And his father, we took his father to the airport on Sunday because they went for the weekend, and I came into the room on Monday morning and Damon was dying. And he said, “I am dying and I want to die in this house.” And within six hours, he had the most peaceful death I had ever seen, and I had watched many people die. It was just one breath out, and one breath in, and one breath out. And then he died.
That was amazing. The gift! He resurrected himself. He found strength within himself.
And that's what Jesus did for people who were sick. He called out the Spirit in them, the healing spirit within them, and they began to live and be healed. And that's what happened with Damon.
Julia Sommerfield: A really pretty story and a really pretty thing to kind of wrap up this interview with. Do you have like just one final word to say about Bethany House or just for people to listen to and be inspired? A lot of young people are going to be hearing this interview, this is a school radio station.
Michael Horank: Yeah, my counsel is don't be afraid to be an agent, to be a vehicle, to be an instrument of change, to create a better world where it's easier for people to be good. Seize whatever opportunities you have daily to be kind, to be generous, to work for peace, to work for justice. Do what you can.
Julia Sommerfield: Thank you so, so much for doing this interview. I'm like really going to talk to you and I feel so inspired. Like I think you have such an incredible story.
And I know you've done so much more than just this. So it was very amazing to like hear at least one piece of the differences you've made.
Michael Horank: Well, thank you, Julia, for the opportunity. Yes, I really enjoyed it.
THE ROUNDUP
The Fordham Catholic Worker held a vigil outside New York City’s St. Patrick's Cathedral during the 10 a.m. Mass on April 21, according to the Fordham University student newspaper. About 20 individuals participated, holding signs remembering victims of the conflict in Gaza. They distributed a leaflet addressing the Archdiocese: “As we witness the continuing horror of grieving families, orphaned children and a starving populace, we stand in front of St. Patrick’s Cathedral to keep vigil and to invite the Archdiocese of New York to speak out and stand with us in this plea for an end to the bombing which has killed tens of thousands of innocent civilians.” They also held signs with messages such as “Pope Says End War Now” and “Stop Gaza Genocide.” The Fordham Catholic Worker is a student club that started in 2023 when members of the New York Catholic Worker came to speak to a “Liturgy That Does Justice” class. Read the article here: Fordham Catholic Worker Attends Vigil for Gaza Victims – The Fordham Ram
Casa Maria Catholic Worker (Tucson, Arizona) recently protested in front of a property owned by a “notorious slumlord,” demanding he sell his properties in South Tucson, one of which was recently involved in a fire. One of the Catholic Workers, Brian Flagg, is also a member of the South Tucson city council; the city sued the property owner in January, and the city is preparing to inspect the properties to ensure compliance a court settlement by May 1st. Read about it here: Casa Maria workers lead protest with community (kgun9.com)
The San Jose Catholic Worker is looking for additional community members. The house is located in downtown San Jose near the Japantown neighborhood, and is currently occupied by the leader of the house, Ashley Walker, along with her two children and a guest family. New community members would be provided with a room and board and a need-based stipend. Those interested should email Ashley at ashley@sjcw.org.
Vogue magazine recommends Dorothy Day’s The Long Loneliness as one of “12 stunning autobiographies (that) will leave you in wonder.” The recommendation is brief: “Her autobiography captures a storied life, including her religious conversion, her personal conflicts over motherhood, and her founding and operation of the Catholic Worker newspaper. Her autobiography stands as an exquisite piece of personal reflection and social activism.” Read it here: The Best Autobiographies to Entertain and Inspire
CALENDAR
April 27 | South Bend, Indiana
Catholic Worker Dance Party
April 28 | Staten Island, New York
Dorothy Day Art Show & Craft Fundraiser
May 8 - May 12 | Kent, Great Britain
European Catholic Worker Gathering 2024
May 13 | Chicago + virtual
The Fourth Annual Berrigan-McAlister Award: Celebrating the Los Angeles Catholic Worker
June 3 - June 7 | Cuba City, Wisconsin
Stories of the Land: Decolonization, Earth Regeneration, & Spiritual Ecology
A FEW GOOD WORDS
Thank God for Everything
From “May,” in the book On Pilgrimage, by Dorothy Day.
White goats leaping in the violets,
Goats with their wattles,
Ducks with their waddles,
Black crows feasting on brown ploughed earth,
Walking in line by the green wheat field.This is a poem written for my grandchild Rebecca, who was made a child of God May 6. So I always remember this day as well as her birthday. Some days we think of ourselves as mourning and weeping in this valley of tears. Other days we feel like shouting, “All ye works of the Lord, bless ye the Lord! Praise Him, adore Him, above all forever!”
Spring in the country, with its countless duties of ploughing, planting, and the care of new creatures! One of the greatest joys in life is bathing a new baby who stretches and yawns and opens its mouth like a little bird for provender. “Give us this day our daily bread!”
Thank God for everything. Thank God that in other countries peasants are ploughing and planting and tending new things – all of them samples of heaven, all of them portents of that new heaven and earth wherein justice dwelleth.
Leaving out of account Divine Providence, there is chaos and destruction ahead, and injustices breeding new wars. But we cannot leave out of account Divine Providence, so we can live in hope and faith and charity, and rejoice and continue to pray and do penance to avert another war.
We must rejoice this month of May and let our glance of joy rest on beauty around us. It would be thankless to do otherwise.
Read the entire essay here: On Pilgrimage: May