Past Events

Please join us for an exciting conversation on Dorothy Day as a contemporary exemplar of holiness! This roundtable will feature Cardinal Timothy Dolan and four Manhattan College alumni and current students, all of whom have devoted their professional and personal lives to solidarity with and advocacy on behalf of the poorest and most marginalized members of their communities. After the discussion, please enjoy exploring Dorothy's life and legacy and viewing important artifacts from her life in the newly-opened Dorothy Day Center. This event is free and open to the public

Building a World Without Nuclear Weapons: An Urgent Imperative” is the topic of an online forum on Saturday, January 27, 2¬-4 pm ET. Its focus will be the increasing threat of nuclear war and what ordinary citizens can do to prevent it. The speakers are John C. Wester, Archbishop of Santa Fe, NM, who in 2022 led the way in the U.S. Catholic Church with his groundbreaking pastoral letter on nuclear disarmament; Dr. Ira Helfand, co-founder and past president of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War; and Marie Dennis, Catholic Nonviolence Initiative/Pax Christi International. Pax Christi Massachusetts is sponsoring this event in association with Pax Christi USA, with many co-sponsors from across North America.

Join us in a Celebration of  Eucharist for the Abolition of Nuclear Weapons on the 43rd anniversary of the Death of Servant of God, Dorothy Day with Archbishop John C. Wester of Santa Fe, author of Living in the Light of Christ's Peace: A Conversation Toward Nuclear Disarmament

We look forward to welcoming Lincoln Rice, PhD, to Manhattan College for the annual Dorothy Day lecture, co-sponsored by the Dorothy Day Guild and the Dorothy Day Center for the Study and Promotion of Social Catholicism. This year’s lecture will take place on Thursday, November 2nd at 6:30 pm in the Alumni Room at Manhattan College’s O’Malley library.

Lincoln received his doctorate in moral theology from Marquette University in 2013 and has been a member of Milwaukee's Casa Maria Catholic Worker community since 1998. He is the author of Healing the Divide: A Catholic Racial Justice Framework Inspired by Dr. Arthur Falls, and editor of The Forgotten Radical Peter Maurin: Easy Essays From The Catholic Worker. Lincoln will speak to us this year on Peter Maurin’s philosophy, his significance for the Catholic Worker movement, and what we can learn from Peter today. 

We are celebrating one of Dorothy’s favorite saints this fall, St. Thérèse of Lisieux, whose feast day is on October 1st. Although she was initially put off by Therese’s ‘littleness,’ Day came to see the spirituality of St. Therese as a powerful force for social change in an increasingly anxious and depersonalized world.  The Guild is hosting an October reading group and book club of Dorothy Day’s Thérèse which meets over Zoom on four Wednesdays, October 4th, 11th, 18th, and 25th, from 8-9pm Eastern/7-8pm Central.

If you were not able to attend the reading group and are interested in learning more about Dorothy’s love for the Little Flower, please enjoy our mini-lecture series which was created to accompany the book club.

To mark the close of Dorothy’s 125th year, we hosted our first Manhattan walking pilgrimage of significant sites in Dorothy’s life and the early years of the Catholic Worker movement on Saturday, October 21st. This pilgrimage takes us to the places where Dorothy prayed, protested, and offered the works of mercy for nearly 50 years. Beginning in Union Square, the pilgrimage route takes between two and three hours to walk and concludes at Maryhouse, Dorothy Day’s final home. You can view the map here.

If you would like to make this pilgrimage yourself, please visit our walking tour page by clicking the button "TOUR PAGE"

 The  Dorothy Day  set sail for its inaugural voyage  on April 28th from the St. George Ferry  Terminal on Staten Island. To view the livestream of the opening ceremony, including  DOT Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez’s (bilingual!) reflection on justice, activism, and  the dignity of the poor, as well as The Dirty Rotten System band’s rousing rendition of “If  I Had a Hammer (Ferry)” please visit the NYC DOT YouTube channel linked above by clicking "Launch Livestream"

In partnership with Manhattan College, the Dorothy Day Guild was proud to sponsor this  dialogue exploring Dorothy’s life and legacy to mark the beginning of a year-long  celebration of her 125 birthday on November 8th. 

St. Francis de Sales Church in Manhattan welcomed readers and Dorothy Day admirers  to a special open session of their parish book club to hear from author John Loughery.  Loughery published this new biography of Dorothy with his co-author, Blythe Randolph in  2020. 

 On Dec. 8, 2021, the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, the Archdiocese of New  York celebrated the conclusion of the diocesan phase of the canonization cause for  Dorothy Day. At a Young Adult Mass held at New York’s Saint Patrick’s Cathedral,  Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan formalized the send-off of the evidence of Dorothy Day’s  holiness, amassed by the  Dorothy Day Guild,  to the  Congregation for the Causes of  Saints in Rome.  You can view  a recording of the mass  and holy hour  on the Cathedral’s  YouTube channel by clicking "Youtube Link"

An international webinar co-sponsored by the Dorothy Day Guild, featuring Noel E. Borador of Nazareth House in the Philippines, Anne Dowling of Dorothy Day House in Australia, Gerard Moorman of Jeanette Noëlhuis in the Netherlands, and Henry Simonin of Le Dorothy in France.

 The  Dorothy Day  set sail for its inaugural voyage  on April 28th from the St. George Ferry  Terminal on Staten Island. To view the livestream of the opening ceremony, including  DOT Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez’s (bilingual!) reflection on justice, activism, and  the dignity of the poor, as well as The Dirty Rotten System band’s rousing rendition of “If  I Had a Hammer (Ferry)” please visit the NYC DOT YouTube channel linked above by clicking "Launch Livestream"

The Dorothy Day Guild and America Media presented a commemoration of the 40th anniversary of the death of Servant of God Dorothy Day on Nov. 29, 2020, featuring a conversation about her living legacy with New York Times columnist David Brooks, Comment magazine editor Anne Snyder and The New Yorker contributor Paul Elie. The event is convened by Robert Ellsberg, publisher at Orbis Books, and the panel is moderated by America Media's Colleen Dulle. You can view a recording of the event on America Media’s YouTube channel.

This day of reflection, sponsored by Maryknoll in November, 2019, featured these special presentations by Kate Hennessy, Robert Ellsberg, and Patrick and Kathleen DeSutter Jordan as well as a talk on the Catholic Worker today by Amanda Daloisio, editor of The Catholic Worker and Jackie Allen-Doucot of the Hartford Catholic Worker. 

The Maryknoll sisters have graciously provided links to videos of all the presentations at the Dorothy Day symposium. 

The Sheen Center for Thought and Culture and the Dorothy Day Guild were the proud co-sponsors of a special exhibition, A New World:  Contemporary Art Exploring Dorothy Day’s Vision of Social Justice. The roster of artists included those whose work appears in The Catholic Worker newspaper as well as formerly unhoused and imprisoned artists. Each artist is driven to communicate a message of hope as well as the prophetic warning that motivates contemplative activism today. Conceived and curated by sculptor, painter and Guild member Anthony Santella, the exhibition opened with a reception on Saturday, December 16, 2017 in the Sheen Center’s Gallery, 18 Bleecker St., in New York City.

The University of St. Francis in Fort Wayne, Indiana, hosted a conference, Dorothy Day and the Church: Past, Present, and Future, May 13 – 15, 2015 that explored Dorothy Day’s life, legacy, and contemporary significance for the Church.  Guild members Robert Ellsberg and Martha Hennessy were among the many presenters.  To learn more, see:  Conference Recalls Day as Model for Catholic Action and purchase the book published following the conference here.

St. Thomas University in Miami, Florida, held a conference on March 7 – 8, 2014, titled Dorothy Day:  A Saint For Our Time.  Through major addresses, formal papers, and “round table discussions,” the conference explored those aspects of her life that have brought her to the threshold of sainthood.  Guild Executive Committee member Geoffrey B. Gneuhs provided us with a report from the conference.