The Third Tuesday in Advent -- Dorothy Day
A Reflection on Dorothy Day’s Room for Christ (pp. 176-83)
It is almost a throw-away line in Luke’s gospel, one you might miss if you’re not paying attention. In between describing Jesus’ birth to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the joyous reception that greet the infant Jesus by the shepherds in the field and the angels on high, Luke feels compelled to explain why this astonishing birth took place in a meager manger: “…because there was no place for them in the inn.” Luke 2:7b.
This one clause could well be the motto for the life of Dorothy Day. As she explains at the very outset of her Advent reflection: “It is no use saying that we are born two thousand years too late to give room to Christ. Nor will those who live at the end of the world have been born too late. Christ is always with us, always asking for room in our hearts.”
But for Dorothy Day, this call to hospitality is not merely spiritual (“in our hearts”) but incarnational (“in the streets”!). She reminds us that anytime we encounter a person in need, we are encountering the Christ Child and his mother longing for room at the inn.
I am convinced she is right: for all the drama of Jesus’ birth itself, perhaps the most theologically important moment in the Nativity narrative is just before God’s Son enters our world, when He is at his most vulnerable in Mary’s womb, when he comes knocking at the inn-door, desperately seeking our company, our welcome, our care, longing to be with us under the same roof, begging us to let him in.
So here is one way of putting the question: what if the role we were given in the Christmas pageant was that of the innkeeper? What if the role we are given in the drama of our own Christmas story is that of the innkeeper? In the midst of the busy-ness of our lives, in the midst of our exhaustion, in the midst of our preoccupations, will we make room for God when he comes knocking? Will we take the risk of letting him in?
First a bohemian and then a radical, Dorothy Day (1897-1980) eventually converted to Roman Catholicism and matured into a Christian activist who worked for such social causes as pacifism and women's suffrage through the prism of the Catholic Church. In 1933, she co-founded The Catholic Worker, a newspaper promoting Catholic teachings that became very successful and spawned the Catholic Worker Movement, which tackled issues of social justice. Day also helped establish special homes to help those in need.
It is almost a throw-away line in Luke’s gospel, one you might miss if you’re not paying attention. In between describing Jesus’ birth to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the joyous reception that greet the infant Jesus by the shepherds in the field and the angels on high, Luke feels compelled to explain why this astonishing birth took place in a meager manger: “…because there was no place for them in the inn.” Luke 2:7b.
This one clause could well be the motto for the life of Dorothy Day. As she explains at the very outset of her Advent reflection: “It is no use saying that we are born two thousand years too late to give room to Christ. Nor will those who live at the end of the world have been born too late. Christ is always with us, always asking for room in our hearts.”
But for Dorothy Day, this call to hospitality is not merely spiritual (“in our hearts”) but incarnational (“in the streets”!). She reminds us that anytime we encounter a person in need, we are encountering the Christ Child and his mother longing for room at the inn.
I am convinced she is right: for all the drama of Jesus’ birth itself, perhaps the most theologically important moment in the Nativity narrative is just before God’s Son enters our world, when He is at his most vulnerable in Mary’s womb, when he comes knocking at the inn-door, desperately seeking our company, our welcome, our care, longing to be with us under the same roof, begging us to let him in.
So here is one way of putting the question: what if the role we were given in the Christmas pageant was that of the innkeeper? What if the role we are given in the drama of our own Christmas story is that of the innkeeper? In the midst of the busy-ness of our lives, in the midst of our exhaustion, in the midst of our preoccupations, will we make room for God when he comes knocking? Will we take the risk of letting him in?
First a bohemian and then a radical, Dorothy Day (1897-1980) eventually converted to Roman Catholicism and matured into a Christian activist who worked for such social causes as pacifism and women's suffrage through the prism of the Catholic Church. In 1933, she co-founded The Catholic Worker, a newspaper promoting Catholic teachings that became very successful and spawned the Catholic Worker Movement, which tackled issues of social justice. Day also helped establish special homes to help those in need.
Don't we sometimes have to admit Christ because all else has failed? There's no where else to turn...but God isn't proud I don't think.
ReplyDelete