This is a very good article by Ellen Finnigan, taken from LewRockwell.com. The question she poses is whether or not Dorothy Day was a libertarian, because of her attitude towards the state.
Ms. Finnigan shares two wonderful quotes by Peter Maurin:
"Sure I’m an anarchist. All thinking people are anarchists, but I prefer the name personalist."
"We must have a sense of responsibility to take care of our own, and our neighbor, at a personal sacrifice. That is the first principle. It is not the function of the state to enter into these realms... Charity is personal. Charity is love."
The first quote is timely because most people do not think, and are therefore at the mercy of the state. The second quote hearkens Ayn Rand. Charity is an independent personal choice. It should not be an involuntary act at the point of a gun. Charity at the hands of the state is not charity. It is coercive and fosters dependency, which sets out to break the human spirit into submission to the state.
Ms. Finnigan hits on an idea that has been lost in the Catholic Church in the last 50 years: Catholicism and socialism are not compatible! In his encyclical Quadragesimo Anno, Pius XI said "No one can be at the same time a sincere Catholic and a true socialist." Amid all of the current chaos and the acceleration on the road to serfdom, these ideas are making a strong comeback. Hopefully this will continue. Hopefully people will look to the examples of St. Thomas Aquinas, The Late Scholastics, and Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin.
Our first and only Roman Catholic president, John F. Kennedy, stated the truth in his innagural address:
"The rights of man come not from the generosity of the state but from the hand of God."
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