The Duty of Delight by Dorothy Day

Author:Dorothy Day [Ellsberg, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-88884-6
Publisher: The Crown Publishing Group
Published: 2011-10-25T00:00:00+00:00

1962

WEDNESDAY JANUARY 10 [PITTSBURGH]

Slept at Strassers until 9, Erica drove me to Duquesne chapel where there was a Mass beautifully participated in by the students.

Later I went downtown a few blocks to Kaufman’s to buy wool stockings, a present from the Strassers, a great comfort in this zero weather. Also a pulldown over-the-ears hat, a crocheted black wool. What fun to spend money on some clothes when one is used to hand-me-downs from the clothes’ room at the Catholic Worker. Women never cease to be interested in clothes, no matter how old they get.

Eric Gill wrote a good deal on the subject of clothes but the most moving was his meditation on Christ being stripped of his garments.

After supper, we went to see Bishop Wright. I had thought just to “pay my respects” but he was home and welcomed us all most affably. We saw his collection of Joan of Arc statues, pictures, manuscripts, etc, which he has been collecting since he was 14. He knows so many people we know, and asked about the trip, where I had spoken, where I was going, whom I would see in Chicago.

We did not talk of pacifism, anarchism, communism, Cuba, Spain, nor of the Holy Father and his great messages to the world, nor of the coming ecumenical council because of which, in connection with which, Bishop Wright flies to Rome monthly. But it was a pleasant two-hour meeting and I am grateful indeed to the Bishop for his friendship and help.

A seaman, John Givens, brought me a statue of Joan of Arc years ago and someone around the CW (where we hold all things in common—in theory) walked off with it. Bishop Wright gave me another and I shall treasure this figure of a girl and her sword, who died for conscience (and for the Church).

JANUARY 14. EVANSTON

The train from Pittsburgh was filthy, stinking from the men’s room, no drinking water, no water to wash with in the ladies’ room. We left at 11:30, got into Union Station at 7:30. One walks miles in a vast station (with heavy suitcase), waits interminably for a cab, etc. I list these inconveniences to point to the discomforts of our luxury-loving, efficiency-minded “civilization.” Busses are far more comfortable and convenient as far as I’m concerned.

Karl Meyer’s St. Stephen’s House of Hospitality is on W. Oak St. in one of the infamous tenements owned by Winkles, a Scrooge-like figure of greed and infamous exploitation of the needy. When I got there after a day of rest at Nina’s, Erica Enzer, who was one of the first to practice civil disobedience at the Omaha Missile base, was with Bob washing walls and floors and moving boxes of newspapers and such like down in the basement. Erica is a non-believer, and a warm and loving soul, serving Christ in His hidden guise, tho she denies Him. And how many there are who say Lord, Lord, and do not recognize Him in his poor.

Certainly Karl is in closest touch with the destitute.

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