"Don't call me a saint; I don't want to be dismissed that easily." Dorothy Day
Ok, the election is over. The irrelevant continue babbling, and the nonidelogue technocrats who enable the ideological bastards are trying to regain some semblance of groundedness. In the annual meeting of the Catholic Bishops in Baltimore, they couldn't come up with a statement on the economy in the US. But, they decided that they'd unanimously endorse Dorothy Day for sainthood.
Oh happy day...of course, St Dotty of Staten Island would drip cigarette ashes on the proclamation, tell 'em to wrap fish in it and go do something that actually could help somebody. Taking over the mantle of Irrelevant, clueless nonsense, the American Catholic Bishops are playing into the hands of what my old friend and consulting Feminist Radical Catholic Theologian, Mary Hunt refers to as the second largest religious denomination in the country -- the ex-Catholics some of whom like me who pay attention. By endorsing the Sainthood of Dorothy Day, they're not wrong. But, there are a lot of contradictions in that endorsement that we should probably not forget; they obviously have. Or, and this is troubling on multiple levels they don't care.
If Saint Dorothy Day wandered into the offices of the American Catholic Bishops Cabal and Chowder Sipping-Marching Society, and flipped through the policy letters posted on the bulletin board -- "No birth control paid for by insurance companies!" "Abortion is the unforgivable sin" "Religious freedom is under attack!" "Vote for the Rich, not the Democrats" and "The pederast priests were temped by the dewy butts of the altar boys so they need to be forgiven...", Then Saint Dorothy Day would snub out a cigarette in one of the bishops' cup of coffee, tell them to sell the jewelry and give the proceeds to the poor and then go hold some drunken wino's hand while he had the DTs...
She wouldn't be seen with the people who are going to cannonize her unless they were going to give the
Catholic Workers a bunch of money. This would irritate them, as would her calling them fat Mick and Dago bastards, and telling them to get off their fat asses and follow Jesus...Intentionally undiplomatic, politically incorrect, coherent, focused on the big picture and opposed to crony capitalism and accomomodation with people like Mitt Romney and Donald Trump, she's a problem for these guys who are soooooooo smooth and comfortable in the corridors of power.
She was comfortable there as well -- not because she took them seriously, but because she had a knack for cutting to the reality of the issue -- as long as people are cold, hungry, homeless, need health care and clothes and hope and education, we are revealed for the corrupt, ugly and evil species that we are. If you're not doing everything you can to fix it, you're wrong. Greed and pride in greed are sin; allowing people to need the basic necessities of life and a fair share of hope and prosperity is sin. She'd walk up to Ratzinger and say something like "Red Prada pumps? What would Jesus do? Aren't you ashamed? You should be ashamed..." Oh, they'll pretend they love her. They'll pretend to emulate her. They'll praise her...and then go off to ask Trump and Murdoch for money for the upkeep of the facade and the whitening of the sepluchurs.
Comments