My feelings of this moment in the biography, "Dorothy Day: Dissenting Voice of the American Century" by John Loughery, Blythe Randolph, were interesting enough to record.
"The baptism of Tamar Teresa Batterham took place in July 1927 at Our Lady Help of Christians."
This was a major transformative moment for Dorothy. She clearly was evolving from her atheist, communist friends.
My initial feeling was that of sadness. I felt like the church had gotten their hooks in her. That she had succumb to the great con.
But as I kept reading, that changed.
For me, this was the moment that made it ok.
The Communist Party cared about the welfare of the poor but was unequivocal in its opposition to religion, and everyone at the League or The New Masses was a confirmed atheist. She asked the elderly Spanish priest at the small church that she attended during the winter months in Manhattan, Our Lady of Guadalupe on West 14th Street, about this troubling dichotomy. Father Zachary Saint-Martin’s counsel was reassuring. Keep your job, he told her. You have a child to support. That must be your priority, and if your faith is strong enough, there is no need to worry about anything else.
In fact, it made me side with the church. Her atheist friends were going to be the judgemental ones. Not the church.
In fact, it made me realize that the conversion was a true transcendence.
I initially wondered if you needed a faith to be a good person. I don't believe you do.
But if you want to understand why caring for the unloved and forgotten is at the core of everything that matters to God... To the All of the All, then you have no choice but to jump off the cliff of the cosmic, spiritual abyss.
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