Catholic Worker Movement

Roman Catholic lay movement

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History

Catholic Worker Movement, Roman Catholic lay movement in the United States and Canada, emphasizing personal reform, radical agrarianism, absolute pacifism, and the personal practice of the principles in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. The movement was founded in 1933 by Dorothy Day (1897–1980) at the instigation of Peter Maurin (1877–1949), a self-described peasant-philosopher and Christian radical. Maurin and Day’s program provided for round-table discussions of Christian social thought, the opening of houses of hospitality for...