America
magazine, a publication of the Jesuits, a Catholic religious Order, recently — July
23, 2019 — published an article by Dean Dettloff, America’s Toronto,
Ontario, correspondent and a junior member of the Institute for Christian
Studies. The article, “The
Catholic Case for Communism,” is a graphic illustration of the problems
associated with people projecting their own opinions on to individuals or
groups they admire, whether the admired individuals or groups ever expressed
sympathy with them, or even if they were opposed to them.
 |
| Dorothy Day |
By twisting the
sense of what Dorothy Day, the founder of the Catholic Worker Movement, said,
Dettloff was able to put a very sympathetic interpretation on something with
which Day had very little (if any) sympathy — the abolition of private
property. In this, Dettloff was greatly
assisted by widespread misunderstanding of certain fundamental principles of
natural law, modernist interpretations of Catholic doctrine and social
teaching, and the unfortunate fact that some of Day’s followers have let their
enthusiasm (in the Ronald Knox sense) run away with them, and they have
attributed to her an infallibility she was far from claiming.
As Day was the
first to admit, she made mistakes. She
also sometimes said things in ways that left them open to misinterpretation,
which is what Dettloff capitalized on. Nor
does this impugn her standing with God or the Catholic Church. Where Dettloff tried to measure the Catholic
Church and its teachings by the standard of his interpretation of Dorothy Day,
Dorothy Day was rather clear that she measured herself and others (mostly
herself) by her understanding of the Catholic Church and its teachings.
Was Day’s
interpretation always correct? Since she
herself made no claim to infallibility, it would be ludicrous to impute it to
her. Nor is it essential that she be
right all the time — or even any of the time, strictly speaking. God does not judge that way.
 |
| G.K. Chesterton |
Unfortunately,
human beings do, and that is why it is essential that errors such as Dettloff’s
be corrected whenever they occur. This
is all the more critical in that there are people who support Day’s “cause” for
canonization, or official recognition as a saint by the Catholic Church,
meaning she is in Heaven. If people get
the wrong “message” from Day, her “cause” could very easily come grinding to a
halt, perhaps permanently.
Purely by
coincidence, last week we noted three examples of how this could happen. In Distributism
and Dissent, and Dissent
and Distributism, we gave our opinion as to why the “cause” of the English
writer Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) was not opened: some of
Chesterton’s modern followers have put interpretations on his words and actions
that — however closely Chesterton himself adhered to Catholic teachings — are
greatly at variance with Catholic doctrine.
We also noted the case of St. Robert Bellarmine, whose canonization was
delayed for three hundred years before Pope Pius XI corrected some errors
Bellarmine made, and that of Blessed Joachim of Flora, who will probably never
be canonized — not because his writings were heretical (although they were),
but because people used Joachim’s thought as the springboard to invent a new
religion under the name of Christianity.
 |
| Abbott Joachim of Flora |
As we pointed
out, this says nothing about Chesterton, but a great deal about his
followers. By turning Chesterton into a
front man for socialism, modernism, and the New Age, they have (in this
writer’s opinion) all but ensured that Chesterton’s “cause” will go
nowhere. If the followers of Dorothy Day
want to prevent the sabotage of her “cause,” then they must honestly address
and correct any errors she made (and not turn them into Holy Writ, which would
have appalled her), be obedient to the teachings of the Catholic Church and not
necessarily to their own opinion, but above all, correct errors such as those
made by Dettloff.
That is why on
Thursday we will present the response of Mr. Geoffrey Gneuhs to Mr. Dettloff’s
article instead of trying to do it ourselves.
After all, as far as most people are concerned, our opinion is no better
than that of Dettloff — not as good, in fact, because what we say is far from
popular and a great many people do not want to hear it, while Dettloff is
making a good thing of playing to the gallery.
 |
| Dorothy Day |
Geoff’s opinion
of Dorothy Day, however, is based on personal acquaintance with her. He was chaplain to Dorothy Day and the New
York Catholic Worker, and he gave the homily at her funeral in December
1980. He serves on the board of the
Dorothy Day Guild, the organization dedicated to advancing her “cause” for
canonization. Where our opinion of
Dorothy Day is based on some familiarity with her writings and Catholic
teaching, Geoff’s is based on that plus solid experience and fact. We speak as a student. Geoff speaks with authority as a teacher.
We should also
point out that Geoff is a founding member of the Center for Economic and Social
Justice (CESJ), and he is a strong supporter of the Just Third Way. He sees no conflict between the principles of
the Catholic Worker Movement and the Just Third Way. As for differences about how to apply those
principles, much of the discussion at CESJ meetings is how to develop sound
applications. As long as the principles
are adhered to, differences in application amount to very little in the long
run.
On Thursday,
then, we will publish Geoff’s letter on some of Dettloff’s errors (there were
far too many to cover them all). In the
meantime, you might want to visit the website of the Dorothy Day Guild and that
of the Center for Economic and Social Justice
to see where Geoff is coming from.
#30#
