Catholic Worker movement to be topic

The granddaughter of the initiative’s founder will speak at an event planned Sept. 4 and 5 at Villa Maria.

staff report

VILLA MARIA, Pa. — Martha Hennessy, wife, mother, occupational therapist, activist and granddaughter to Dorothy Day, co-founder of the Catholic Worker movement, will speak at a conference retreat Sept. 4-5 at Villa Maria Community Center.

The Catholic Worker Initiative Retreat conference, sponsored by the Sisters of the Humility of Mary and Ursuline Sisters of Youngstown, will explore the aims of the Catholic Worker Initiative and the need for a Catholic Worker house in the Youngstown area. The retreat also will include insights from Hennessy’s work in the area of nonviolent resistance.

The Catholic Worker Movement addresses our God-given call to love our neighbor as ourselves. It also examines injustices in our society and employs nonviolent resistance to those injustices. Day joined forces with French-born philosopher Peter Maurin to found the movement. Its goal is to “live in accordance with the justice and charity of Jesus Christ.” The movement claims more than 185 local Catholic Worker communities providing social services. Each house has a different mission, going about the work of social justice in its own ways, suited to its local region. The Catholic Worker newspaper, still published by the two Catholic Worker houses in New York City, is sold for a penny a copy.

For a number of months, men, women and youth from a number of local parishes and organizations have met with Humility of Mary and Ursuline Sisters to explore the Catholic Worker Movement and the needs in Youngstown.

This two-day retreat will include a panel presentation featuring speakers from Akron, Cleveland and Des Moines Catholic Worker houses who will discuss the creation of the initiative in the community. Additional presentations, small group discussion and reflection time is also included in this two-day process. The conference will begin with a keynote speech by Hennessy, who was among 82 arrested at the Jan. 11 protest at the Supreme Court calling for the closing of Guantanamo. Her recent travels include Egypt, Iran, England, Iraq and the Rafah Border. She has lived at her Weathersfield farm for 52 years.

Still Point Theatre Collective will present “Haunted By God: The Life of Dorothy Day,” at 7 p.m. Sept. 4. The dramatic portrait, featuring Still Point founder and director Lisa Wagner Carollo, follows Day from life as a 17- year-old Greenwich Village bohemian through her middle years as a social activist and journalist, to her later years as an elderly leader. Founded in 1993, Chicago’s nonprofit Still Point Theatre Collective is a community of artists who believe that art has value for everyone.

Registration is due by Aug. 21. The fee is $25 and includes conferences, the Still Point Theatre presentation and meals. Overnight accommodations are priced separately. To register or for more information, contact Sherry Lobinger by e-mail at slobinger@humilityofmary.org or call (724) 964-8920 ext.3274.