Quotes from Dorothy Day

Words are as strong and powerful as bombs, as napalm.

It is easier to have faith that God will support each House of Hospitality and Farming Commune and supply our needs in the way of food and money to pay bills, than it is to keep a strong, hearty, living faith in each individual around us - to see Christ in him.

Man is not meant to live alone.

Most of our life is unimportant, filled with trivial things from morning till night. But when it is transformed by love it is of interest even to the angels.

We plant seeds that will flower as results in our lives, so best to remove the weeds of anger, avarice, envy and doubt, that peace and abundance may manifest for all.

It is penance to work, to give oneself to others, to endure the pinpricks of community living.

Our faith is stronger than death, our philosophy is firmer than flesh, and the spread of the Kingdom of God upon the earth is more sublime and more compelling.

The whole point of view of the anarchist is that everything must start from the bottom up, from man. It seems to me so human a philosophy.

When it comes to labor and politics, I am inclined to be sympathetic to the left, but when it comes to the Catholic Church, then I am far to the right.

What we would like to do is change the world - make it a little simpler for people to feed, clothe, and shelter themselves as God intended for them to do.

Christ is God or He is the world's greatest liar and imposter.

God forbid we should have great institutions. The thing is to have many small centres. The ideal is community.

Recording happiness made it last longer, we felt, and recording sorrow dramatized it and took away its bitterness; and often we settled some problem which beset us even while we wrote about it.

The idea that when the health of one member suffers, the health of the whole body is lowered is a teaching of St Paul which is timeless.

The greatest challenge of the day is: how to bring about a revolution of the heart, a revolution which has to start with each one of us?

We cannot build up the idea of the apostolate of the laity without the foundation of the liturgy.

With prayer, one can go on cheerfully and even happily. Without prayer, how grim a journey!

I offered up a special prayer, a prayer which came with tears and anguish, that some way would open up for me to use what talents I possessed for my fellow workers, for the poor.

What else do we all want, each one of us, except to love and be loved, in our families, in our work, in all our relationships?

Love casts out fear, but we have to get over the fear in order to get close enough to love them.

Common sense in religion is rare, and we are too often trying to be heroic instead of just ordinarily good and kind.

How much did I hear of religion as a child? Very little, and yet my heart leaped when I heard the name of God. I do believe every soul has a tendency toward God.

It is only through religion that communism can be achieved, and has been achieved over and over.

Freedom has its roots in religion.