SINCE our last issue, Tess Vaughan has made her oblation in St Gregory's Church, Stratford-upon-Avon on St Benedict's Day, Marie-Louise Edmondson was received as a novice oblate on March 7 and Richard & Jan Cavanagh and Lynne Sedgemore were received as novice oblates during the April retreat.

Oblate Formation

FOLLOWING the suggestions of some of our oblates and the practice of some other communities, it seems that we should offer a more systematic and structured formation to our oblates. Therefore it seem a good idea that we should have a particular topic at each retreat, and to make the material available for those who are not able to be present. So I am suggesting that we should follow the oblate formation programme devised by Sr Dolores Dowling OSB and published on the internet by Sr Sean OSB of Clyde Monastery. Sr Sean has kindly agreed to us making copies of her material for those who are not internet connected. We will start this process at the July Retreat.

Dates for forthcoming retreats

JULY 7 - 9, Sept 29 - Oct 1, Dec 15 - 17, 2000 & next year Apr 6 - 8, Jul 6 - 8, Sept 28 -30, Dec 7 - 9, 2001.

St Benedict for Schools

IN February we received a letter from Vena Eastwood, oblate of Stanbrook Abbey She has been involved in a project of adapting the Rule of St Benedict for use in schools, which she has now completed under the title Ben Addict Rules OK! The book is awaiting publication. She writes, 'What on earth can Benedict's Rule offer to a school community in the 21st century? It can offer wisdom that leads to God; it can offer answers to every community situation and problem. The Rule is the writing of someone who as a young person was totally disillusioned by the world he saw around him. How many of our young people are confused and seeking guidance, how many of those who want to guide them need answers? It has been suggested that management only need Scripture and the Rule of St Benedict to develop their community and every other document, policy, development plan and dare I say it, OFSTED report could be put in the bin!' Vena Eastwood was chaplain at St Benedict's School, Derby, and is currently living for sixth months with the Benedictine Sisters in Erie, Pennsylvania for a period of discernement. We await the publication of the book with eagerness. It is another example how the charism of St Benedict is so valuable for modern people, whether in school, the workplace or in the home.

Monastery in Maximum Security Prison

ANOTHER Benedictine initiative occured in Italy, where the Benedictines of the Fraternity of Jesus, a monastic congregation founded in 1972 have made a foundation on Pianosa, an island near the Tuscany coast, where until 1998 there had been a maximum security prison reserved for terrorists and the mafia. The monks will dedicate themselves to agriculture and spend 4 days a month speaking of Jesus Christ around Europe. Abbot Tarcisio Benevenuti said, 'monasticism represents a great challenge for Europe which risks forgetting Christianity'

Dorothy Day - Benedictine Oblate

CARDINAL John O'Connor, Archbishop of New York, died on May 3. One of the last things he did was to promote the cause of Dorothy Day for canonisation. Dorothy Day is especially significant for us since was a Benedictine oblate of St Pachopius Abbey, Aurora, Illinois.

Dorothy Day was born in New York in 1897, but spent her earliest childhood in San Francisco. One of her earliest memories is of her mother helping people made homeless in the great earthquake of 1906. The family moved to Chicago where Dorothy sang in the choir of the Episcopal church and so became acquainted with the psalms. She won a scholarship to the University of Illinois and began her career as a journalist. Becoming aware of the disparity between the lives of the rich and the poor, she joined the Socialist party. As a journalist she reported on unemployment, strikes, the bread riots, the high cost of living. When she accompanied suffragettes to the White House, she gained a month in gaol. While there she joined a hunger strike and took to reading the bible. The gaol experience was crucial to Dorothy's development, no longer was she just a reporter or observer, now she identified herself with the poor.

Her lifestyle was quite bohemian and non-religious; she had several affairs, one leading to an abortion. She also travelled widely, drifting and searching. During this time she felt 'haunted by God'. She visited churches and dabbled in various religious practices. Eventually she settled on Staten Island, New York and lived with Forster Batterham who shared her political views, but despised religion. Gradually her religious feelings grew, she was drawn to pray, acquired a rosary, and started going to church, all of which caused friction with her lover. When she became pregnant again Batterham did not want the child, but this time Dorothy stood firm and had a daughter, whom she decided to have baptised, Tamar Teresa. This provoked Batterham's departure. By this time Dorothy herself was ready to become a Christian; she chose the Catholic Church because it was the church of the poor.

In 1932 she was commissioned to write an article on a hunger march on Washington, organised by the Communists. This caused a crisis for her as a recent convert, she wrote later in her autobiography, 'I could write, I could protest, to arouse the conscience, but where was the Catholic leadership, in the gathering of bands of men and women together, for the actual works of mercy that the comrades had always made part of their technique in reaching the workers?' So she went to pray at the national shrine of the Immaculate Conception, as she wrote 'a prayer which came with tears and with anguish, that some way would open up for me to use what talents I possessed for my fellow workers, for the poor.'

On returning to New York she met Pater Maurin, and they inspired each other to set up together the Catholic Worker Movement. On May 1, 1933 they produced the first issue of The Catholic Worker which sold at a penny a copy, still the price today. It was aimed to influence Catholics to develop a sense of social and political morality, and concerned especially for the 'poor, the dispossessed, the exploited'. Dorothy synthesized Catholic social teaching to inspire helpers as well as the church leadership. By the end of the year circulation was 100,000, reaching parishes and schools throughout the USA. Catholic Worker Houses were set up to provide homes for poor workers and farms to be social models. Besides these the Movement also supported non-violent protests, pickets and boycotts of stores which exploited workers.

Dorothy was inspired by the Sermon of the Mount, and its teaching on peace. She became a pacifist which brought about opposition, first during the Spanish Civil War and more especially during World War II. Circulation of The Catholic Worker declined drastically from 190,000 to 50,000 mainly because of its pacifist stand. Many Worker Houses closed as the war effort created full employment. Dorothy took a break from the Movement for a period of personal retreat and to devote herself to Tamar. Towards the end of the war she turned one of Worker Houses into a retreat house.

After the war, Dorothy's pacifism led her to oppose first the Atomic bomb and later the Viet Nam war. During the McCarthy era The Catholic Worker was accused of being communist inspired, which was far from the case. Later the paper supported the Civil Rights Movement. Dorothy was one of a small group of people who founded Pax Christi , the movement for Peace and Justice.

Dorothy travelled to Rome in support of John XXIII's encyclical Pacem in terris. She continued to lecture to promote justice and peace, throughout America and Europe. Although her health declined her spirit didn't. In 1973 taking part in a non-violent demonstration with the United Farm Workers for fair wages and working conditions she was arrested and imprisoned for the fourth time. Her last speech was at the Eucharistic Congress in Philadelphia on Hiroshima Day, August 6, 1976. Shortly afterwards she had a heart attack, and eventually died on November 29, 1980.

Dorothy's life work was inspired by the Gospel; she was sustained by daily Mass as often as possible, by praying the office and by the Benedictine spirit she developed as an Oblate.

Cardinal John O'Connor wrote on February 7 in his letter to the Holy See initiating the canonization process '.....in 1997, on the centennial of her birth, I considered her cause for canonization by inviting twenty or so interested persons, among them a few persons who knew Dorothy Day very well and had worked very closely with her, to discuss the issue. All save one were in favor of putting forward her cause expressing reservation by recalling the famous words of Dorothy Day, "Don't trivialize me by trying to make me a saint." Prima facie, such words may seem damning. They are, in fact, paradigmatic of Dorothy Day's deep faith and commitment to the Church. Her personal humility was such that she never considered herself to be holier than any other Catholic, her understanding of the way in which so many of her day would have dismissed her Catholicism and her thirst for social justice as only fit for saints, and not for the everyday believer she considered herself and so many others to be, and her deep love for the saints of the Church all combined to make her renounce any notion of personal sanctity as a means to make her something other than what she had always striven to be: a simple women living the Gospel.

.....To be sure, her life is a model for all in the third millenium, but especially for women who have had or are considering abortions. It is a well-known fact that Dorothy Day procured an abortion before her conversion to the Faith. She regretted it every day of her life. After her conversion from a life akin to that of the pre-converted Augustine of Hippo, she proved a stout defender of human life. The conversion of mind and heart that she exemplified speaks volumes to all women today on two fronts. First, it demonstrates the mercy of God, mercy in that a woman who sinned so gravely could find such unity with God upon conversion. Second, it demonstrates that one may turn from the ultimate act of violence against innocent life in the womb to a position of total holiness and pacifism. In short, I contend that her abortion should not preclude her cause, but intensifies it.

..... it must be said, she often held opinions in common with them (communists, socialists, anarchists). What they held in common was a common respect for the poor and a desire for economic equity. Moreover, her complete commitment to pacifism in imitation of Christ often separated her from these political ideologies. She rejected all military force; she rejected aid to force in any way in a most idealistic manner. So much were her "politics" based on an ideology of nonviolence that they may be said to be apolitical.

Like so many saints of days gone by, she was an idealist in a non-ideal world. It was her contention that men and women should begin to live on earth the life they would one day lead in heaven, a life of peace and harmony. Much of what she spoke of in terms of social justice anticipated the teachings of Pope John Paul II and lends support to her cause.

Dorothy Day's writings are available on the web. See also the Catholic Worker Movement site.