Author Kate Hennessy, Granddaughter of Dorothy Day, Visits Glencairn

We had a lovely evening of sharing and song recently with author, Kate Hennessy and her musician/composer husband Garry Jones in Glencairn. Kate, hailing from Vermont, USA, is the award-winning author of ‘Dorothy Day: The World Will be Saved by Beauty, An Intimate Portrait of my Grandmother’ .

Kate shared with us memories of her mother and grandmother and spoke about her decision to write her biography and memoir of her grandmother, Dorothy Day. Dorothy Day (1897-1980), an American journalist, social activist and catholic convert, founded the Catholic Worker Movement in the United States during the great depression, a movement which today continues to serve the poor and marginalised with Catholic Worker communities active in 30 countries around the world. In 2012, Dorothy Day’s cause for canonisation was unanimously supported by U.S. Bishops and she has been named ‘Servant of God’. New York Archbishop Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan has described her as ‘a saint for our times’. Her words are ever fresh and urgent to us now: “The biggest challenge of the day is: how to bring about a revolution of the heart, a revolution that has to start with each one of us.” 

Kate’s inheritance of her grandmother’s writing talent has enabled her to preserve and to share her treasured memories of her grandmother with future generations through her writing. We thank her for her great undertaking and for the time she spent with us here at Glencairn and our thanks to Stephan Reynolds, Glencairn Lay Associate, for organising this meeting.

 

Photo: left to right, front row – Stephan Reynolds, Kate Hennessy, Gary Jones, back row – M. Marie, Sr Josephine, Sr Kathleen, Sr Angela, Sr Maria Therese, Sr Michele, Sr Denise.