Books

Summary: Relishes life on the land, saying it is a place to retreat to, find God, and to go forth from as apostles. Summarizes five retreat talks whose focus is to increase the desire for sanctity, to a more complete love of God. Gives examples of her failure to love and the struggle to renew love of God and neighbor. (DDLW #482).

Summary: Praises God for May, the month of Mary and full of beauty. Recalls the Catholic Worker began in May sixteen years ago and summarizes their program and the many allied movements of the lay apostolate. Says their pacifism and distributism distinguishes them from other movements. Focuses on voluntary poverty as exemplified in Peter Maurin’s life, especially since he became ill. Reflects on holiness and the call to all to become saints. Includes quotations from her winter’s reading. Keywords: Gandhi, machine, philosophy of work (DDLW #480).

Summary: Ponders the mystery of the love of God for man and man for man. Urges readers to come to their farm for a retreat to renew strength for the apostolate. Express disdain for the Kinsey report on American sexual behavior and presents a sublime vision of sexual love. Includes an extensive passage by Fr. John J. Hugo who himself quotes saints, mystics, scripture, and Church prayers to illustrate how the nuptial union is an analogy of God’s love for us. (DDLW #479).

Summary: Finally Tamar’s son Eric is born. She comments on the child’s baptism and the beginning of her own faith. Considers the role of women as nourishers and upbraids herself for being self-indulgent, quoting St. Theresa of Avila at length on penance. As signs of Spring arrive they move to a “new-old” house and she plans to return to New York. (DDLW #478).

Summary: Still awaiting Tamar’s baby, she mentions neighborly visits and reflects on her family history, and criticizes poorly written books about Mary and the saints. Writes of “feasting and fasting” as Lent begins, enumerating the many mentions of food in the Bible and quoting Dostoevsky’s character Father Zossima on the importance of fasting. (DDLW #477).

Summary: States the objectives of the C.W. and defends it against the accusations of other Catholics and secular thought. Writes on such themes as marriage, sex, 10VQ’ human condition, poverty, economics and a variety of Church doctrines. All of these topics are treated from an orthodox Catholic point of view. The book is adapted from the diary she kept in 1948, when she spent the first four months with Tamar (daughter) and the rest of the year at Mott Street and the retreat farm in Newburgh. She noted that the book could be called a woman’s book, since parts of it are directed solely to women. As usual, much of the book dwells on the day-to-day happenings in her life. (DDLW #5).

Summary: Introduces the book as “a woman’s book, and for women,” dealing “with things of concern to us all, the family, the home, how to live, and what to live and what we live by.” (DDLW #475).