Barry Estabrook, Tomatoland: How Modern Industrial Agriculture Destroyed Our Most Alluring Fruit. Kansas City: Andrews McMeel, 2011. Reviewed by Don Lassus, MD Don is a former Catholic Worker at Casa Juan Diego and resident physician training in family medicine in Los Angeles County. A frequent task at Casa Juan Diego is to drive guests to… continue reading
Rural Roads to Distributism and Family/Community Farms
Richard Aleman is the Editor of the Distributist Review. Peter Maurin’s program for the Catholic Worker had an important agricultural aspect. Catholic Workers have always been interested in the Catholic Rural Life Program under the inspiration of Msgr. Luigi Ligutti. Thanks to David S. Bovee’s new book about the illustrious history of the National Catholic… continue reading
Book Review: Saved By Beauty: A Spiritual Journey with Dorothy Day
Saved by Beauty: A Spiritual Journey with Dorothy Day by Michael O’Neill McGrath. World Library Publications, the Music and Liturgy Division of the J. S. Paluch Company, 2012. Brother Michael O’Neill McGrath, artist and Oblate of St. Francis de Sales, has just published a book entitled with the famous saying from Dostoevsky frequently quoted by… continue reading
Book Review: The Hound of Distributism. Edited by Richard Aleman. American Chesterton Society, 2012.
With anxiety about the U.S. economy still running high, the paramount issue in the current race for president is boosting growth and putting Americans back to work. As it usually is, the choice between competing political visions, and thus the economic future, is being cast in the worn and tired ideas of capitalism and socialism. … continue reading
American Madonna: Crossing Borders with the Virgin Mary. Orbis Books, 2010.
I enjoyed reviewing Deirdre Cornell’s new book, American Madonna: Crossing Borders with the Virgin Mary , partly because it is an excellent book, partly because I met the author in central Mexico in the early 1990s. I never forgot her; she is one of those people that linger in your memory. With my own research and… continue reading
All the Way to Heaven: The Selected Letters of Dorothy Day. Edited by Robert Ellsberg, Marquette Univ. Press, 2010
I would not go so far as to say that I have been steeped in Dorothy Day lore, but I have been a Catholic Worker for a while, and we do talk about Dorothy quite a bit around here at the Houston Catholic Worker. I am surrounded by people who know an immense amount about… continue reading
Compelling Story of Casa Juan Diego
Book Review Mercy Without Borders: The Catholic Worker and Immigration. Paulist Press, 2010. Few former Ohioans, if any, have done more for the poor and the immigrant than Mark and Louise Zwick, who created Casa Juan Diego in Houston to help the thousands upon thousands of immigrants and refugees who have come from Latin America… continue reading
William T. Cavanaugh, Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire, Eerdmans, 2008, 115pp., $12.00 (pbk) ISBN: 9780802845610
William T. Cavanaugh’s recent work, Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire , is a timely read for those seeking to reflect upon the manner in which their Christian faith can be brought to bear not only on their consumer habits but also on the market framework within which those habits are instilled and fostered. Instead of… continue reading
A Familiar Pilgrimage In Remarkable Detail: A Review Essay: The Duty of Delight: The Diaries of Dorothy Day, ed. Robert Ellsberg (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 2008), 669 pp. + xxxiv.
Michael Baxter teaches at the University of Notre Dame and lives and works at the Catholic Worker in South Bend, Indiana. He is also national secretary for the Catholic Peace Fellowship. Introduction The arrangement whereby the diaries of the Dorothy Day were transferred from the Catholic Worker in New York to the archives at Marquette… continue reading
The Vocation of Business: Social Justice in the Marketplace by John Médaille. Continuum Books, 2007
In his new book , The Vocation of Business , John Médaille, a businessman who teaches “Social Justice for Business Students” at the University of Dallas, makes a comprehensive case for introducing values such as justice and equity into business practices by applying the principles of Catholic Social Teaching (CST). It certainly seems like a reasonable… continue reading