Earlier this week, the 2024 presidential election ended with victory for Donald Trump. Some voters are elated, others bitterly disappointed. Regardless of our reaction, we have all had our chance at the ballot box to do our small part in deciding the future of our country. It can be tempting to think that our work is done for another four years. In truth, it’s just beginning.
As Catholics we are called to perform works of mercy, to serve our brothers and sisters on the margins. That work continues regardless of who wins an election. I tried to hold onto that attitude throughout the election season, to keep myself rooted in a larger goal instead of a single electoral victory. For this week’s film I chose a biopic about a person who, I believe, embodied that attitude: Dorothy Day, the writer, activist and co-founder of the Catholic Worker, and one of my heroes.
The film is “Entertaining Angels: The Dorothy Day Story” (1996), directed by Michael Ray Rhodes and written by John Wells, with Moira Kelly in the titular role. It offers a sketch of Day’s life from the 1910s to the 1930s. We see her as a young radical in New York, a socially-conscious journalist who hangs out with a bohemian crowd, including Communist writer Mike Gold (Paul Lieber), playwright Eugene O’Neill (James Lancaster) and gadabout journalist Lionel Moise (Boyd Kestner). Dorothy has a romance with Moise, but their relationship withers after Dorothy becomes pregnant and Moise encourages an abortion. Recovering on Staten Island, Dorothy rediscovers love with the gentle and principled Forster Batterham (Lenny Von Dohlen) and they have a daughter, Tamar (Heather Camille).
But Dorothy’s heart is restless, drawing her again and again to a Catholic church on the island. She converts to Catholicism with the accompaniment of Sister Aloysius (Melinda Dillon), shattering her relationship with Forster. Dorothy and Tamar move back to New York City, where she meets French Catholic activist Peter Maurin (Martin Sheen), and together they found the Catholic Worker, a movement dedicated to living out the Gospel through solidarity with the poor and marginalized. In this work she finds purpose and community, but also great hardship. Money is constantly tight, church leadership is hostile, and the people she serves are often erratic, self-destructive and violent. She finds herself in a dark night of the soul, unsure if she can continue.
In one particularly dramatic scene, Dorothy enters a church during a thunderstorm and harangues the statue of the crucified Christ. “These brothers and sisters of yours, the ones you want me to love… Let me tell you something. They smell. They have lice and tuberculosis. Am I to find you in them? Well, you’re ugly, you drink, and you wet your pants, and you vomit. How could anyone ever love you?” But through her work she comes to realize that this is precisely the point: A follower of Christ loves those deemed unloveable, and looks for hope in the places everyone else has abandoned.
Day is an interesting figure to consider during election season. Despite marching for women’s suffrage (as depicted in the film) she never voted, skeptical of how much change could be achieved through political means. Early in the film, she tells a friend, “The masses need food, not manifestos.” While I disagree with her on the value of voting, I agree with her larger point: If we took more responsibility for taking care of one another, maybe we wouldn’t need to rely so much on politicians.
Day called for “a revolution of the heart,” a shift away from self-interest to solidarity. That isn’t accomplished by a single election: it’s an on-going effort that happens in each of us everyday. We are called to serve our neighbors, no matter who is in the Oval Office. The election ends, but the work of mercy continues.
“Entertaining Angels: The Dorothy Day Story” is streaming on the Roku Channel and YouTube.
