Reviving Catholic Anarchism

The Catholic Anarchism of Dorthy Day and Peter Maurin is looking better and better every day, so dispiriting is this campaign season. The deepest tragedy is that a party that represents a clear, direct, absolute attack on values at the heart of our Catholic faith continues to elicit the loyalty of about 50% of Catholics. The alternative, the Republican Party, is itself a disappointment. While it is defensive of innocent life, the natural family and religious liberty, it is itself enamored of individualism, the corporate market place, and American exceptionalism and blind to Catholic values related to solidarity with the poor and our fundamental communal nature as persons. As the left idolizes the State and the right does the same for the impersonal global market, the micro-communal anarchism of Day-Maurin becomes very refreshing. As I become more cynical about the State and the Market, about the Left and the Right, about an American culture that is late-Protestant and deeply if unconsciously anti-Catholic, I cling more passionately and tenderly to my Christ who comes to me in sacrament, family and the poor who are close to me. Dorothy and Peter: Pray for us!