Authentic alternatives have always been pretty rare - Catholic Worker Movement - Cover Story

National Catholic Reporter, May 21, 1993 by Jeff Dietrich

I don't do mornings well. In fact, I consider them a form of punishment that is only slightly mitigated by liberal infusions of coffee. So when my wife stood between me and the coffee pot this morning to confront me with the news that we had been robbed for the second time in a week by a guest in our hospitality house, my day got off to a bad start and went downhill from there.

While cleaning the toilet, I broke the plunger. On the way to the hardware store, the car broke down. In the afternoon, the drug dealers on the street in front of our house expressed their differences of opinion with AK-47s. No one was hurt, but the police and news helicopters flew around the house for at least two hours.

Living at a Catholic Worker house combines all of the thrills of bungee jumping with the stress of a visit to the dentist. Most normal people assume that Catholic Workers are saints or fools or mentally deficient individuals. Why would a reasonably intelligent person with as much as a single, marketable job skill put up with bad plumbing, junky cars, unruly neighbors and ungrateful guests? It's surely not for the lovely ambience or the good pay.

Just what is it that we think we are trying to accomplish in these desultory attempts to carry on the legacies of Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin? The life is simple, but it is not easy; the work is basic but not very effective; the movement has been around for 60 years but is hardly a household word. There are more Catholic Worker houses today than ever, but they are about as stable as the San Andreas fault.

When I first came here more than 20 years ago, I was an unemployed, college-educated draft resister without a lot of options for the future because I was about to go to jail. I had been raised to believe in God, country, family and a college degree. The system, I was told, works for all, or at least for most people as long as they fulfill their obligations. But the system was not working for me. Without options, possibilities or employment potential, I had nowhere to go and nothing to do.

By combination of dumb luck and divine providence, I discovered the Catholic Worker. Almost immediately I began to see that there was a certain integrity to the life here. Each day we visited the jail with coffee and donuts and served a free meal on skid row; once a week we protested the Vietnam War in front of the federal building; on Sundays we celebrated a simple Eucharistic meal together. Almost immediately I sensed that this is what Christ would be doing if he were around: feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, protesting the war, breaking bread with friends.

We still do pretty much the same thing here at the Catholic Worker 23 years later, but I am convinced that I would never have found my way here had it not been for my sense of disassociation with the dominant culture. Christianity, at least as it is presented in the gospels, is a religion of opposition to the idolatrous power structures of the Roman empire and the Judean temple culture. Anyone who had options within that framework was unlikely to seek an alternative. That is why Jesus spent so much time with the poor and powerless; they just didn't have any other options.

The Catholic Worker attempts to respond to the Christian vocation of non-power and the cross, which calls us to live a life in opposition to the spirituality of the dominant power structure. Christianity really doesn't make much sense until we have exhausted all of our options. As Americans, we tend to believe that we live in a world of unlimited potential. The standard myth is that we grow up, get our college degree - or better yet, a master's degree or doctorate - and then go out into the world to transform, humanize, even Christianize the various inhuman social systems. But the reality is that these systems more often tend to humanize and de-Christianize their participants.

Because we have lost contact with any authentic biblical understanding of power, we tend to be naive about its spiritual nature and seductive potential. Thus, terms like "idolatry," the demon-like and "principalities and powers" seem like quaint euphemisms for superstitious practices of the past. In reality, they are terms that define the actual inner spiritually of institutional power in the world today. As theologian William Stringfellow said many years ago, "The principalities are legion: They include all institutions, ideologies, traditions, methods and routines, conglomerates, races and nations."

From beginning to end, the Bible offers a rather consistent rejection of worldly, institutional power in favor of personal and communal interaction. Of all the kings of Judea and Israel mentioned in the Old Testament, God approves of only four. And, ironically, they are the ones who failed in the eyes of the world, creating bureaucratic chaos and losing battles and revenues because they followed God's way rather than the world's.

Seen within this context of rejection of worldly power, the humble, occasionally bold and relatively consistent Catholic Worker witness of hospitality, poverty and nonviolent resistance takes on an entirely new meaning. All of the seemingly mundane, repetitious work of making beds, cooking meals, cleaning the floors, welcoming the poor and, on occasion, going to jail must be seen as a witness against the principalities and powers. I realize how pretentious that must sound, but it's about the only thing that makes this job interesting. We believe that by living in community, working for free, begging for resources and sharing what we have,with each other and the poor, we are giving unmediated witness to God's grace. At the same time, in some small way, we are undermining the sacredness of the consumerist culture that puts all of its emphasis on wealth and commodities.