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#Setting up [[Round table (discussion)|roundtable discussions]] in community centres in order to clarify thought and initiate action.<ref>{{cite book |title=A Revolution of the heart: essays on the Catholic worker |last= Coy |first=Patrick G. |authorlink= |year=1988 |publisher=Temple University Press |location= |page= |pages=16–23 |url= |quote=Peter Maurin }}</ref>
#Setting up [[Round table (discussion)|roundtable discussions]] in community centres in order to clarify thought and initiate action.<ref>{{cite book |title=A Revolution of the heart: essays on the Catholic worker |last= Coy |first=Patrick G. |authorlink= |year=1988 |publisher=Temple University Press |location= |page= |pages=16–23 |url= |quote=Peter Maurin }}</ref>


Maurin expressed his ideas through short pieces of verse that became known as ''Easy Essays''.<ref>{{cite book |title=Loaves and Fishes: The inspiring story of the Catholic Worker Movement |last= Day |first=Dorothy |authorlink= |year=1963 |publisher=Orbis Books |location= |page=5 |pages= |url= |quote=A Knock at the Door }}</ref>
Maurin expressed his ideas through short pieces of verse that became known as ''Easy Essays''{{cite web |title=''Easy Essays'' |url=http://www.walsh.edu/pdf/CatholicRadicalism021607.pdf |accessdate=August 14, 2011 (.pdf, uncopyrighted) from www.walsh.edu}}.<ref>{{cite book |title=Loaves and Fishes: The inspiring story of the Catholic Worker Movement |last= Day |first=Dorothy |authorlink= |year=1963 |publisher=Orbis Books |location= |page=5 |pages= |url= |quote=A Knock at the Door }}</ref>


== Biography ==
== Biography ==

Revision as of 18:23, 14 August 2011

Peter Maurin
Born
Aristode Pierre Maurin

(1877-05-09)May 9, 1877
Oultet, France
DiedMay 15, 1949(1949-05-15) (aged 72)
near Newburgh, New York
Known forCo-Founder of the Catholic Worker

Peter Maurin (May 9, 1877 – May 15, 1949) was a Roman Catholic social activist who founded the Catholic Worker Movement in 1933 with Dorothy Day.

Maurin's vision to transform the social order consisted of three main ideas:

  1. Establishing urban houses of hospitality to care for the destitute.
  2. Establishing rural farming communities to teach city dwellers agrarianism and encourage a movement back-to-the-land.
  3. Setting up roundtable discussions in community centres in order to clarify thought and initiate action.[1]

Maurin expressed his ideas through short pieces of verse that became known as Easy Essays"Easy Essays" (PDF). Retrieved August 14, 2011 (.pdf, uncopyrighted) from www.walsh.edu. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help).[2]

Biography

He was born Aristide Pierre Maurin into a poor farming family in the village of Oultet in the Languedoc region of southern France, where he was one of 24 children. After spending time in the De La Salle Brothers, Maurin served in the Sillon movement of Marc Sangnier until he became discouraged by the Sillonist shift from personalist action towards political action.[3] He briefly moved to Saskatchewan to try his hand at homesteading, but was discouraged by the death of his partner in a hunting accident.[4] He then traveled throughout the American east for a few years, and eventually settled in New York.[5]

"Round-table Discussions, Houses of Hospitality and Farming Communes--those were the three planks in Peter Maurin's platform. There are still Houses of Hospitality, each autonomous but inspired by Peter, each trying to follow Peter's principles. And there are farms, all different but all starting with the idea of the personalist and communitarian revolution. . . Peter was not disappointed in his life's work. He had given everything he had and he asked for nothing, least of all for success."

Dorothy Day on Peter Maurin, in her article commemorating the centenary of his birth [6]

In the mid-1920s, Maurin was working as a French tutor in the New York suburbs. It was at this time Maurin was inspired by the life of Francis of Assisi.[7] He ceased charging for his lessons and asked only that students give any sum they thought appropriate. This was likely prompted by reading about St. Francis, who viewed labor as a gift to the greater community, not a mode of self promotion.[8]

Dorothy Day and The Catholic Worker

Maurin initially proposed the name Catholic Radical for the paper that was distributed as the Catholic Worker beginning May 1, 1933, during the depths of the Great Depression. Maurin began to see it as not quite radical enough, as it had an emphasis on political and union activity. Maurin believed the Catholic Worker should stress life in small agricultural communities. As he liked to say, “there is no unemployment on the land.” Likewise convinced that protest would not bring about real social change, he withdrew from New York to Easton, Pennsylvania, where he worked on the first Catholic Worker-owned farming commune, Mary Farm.[citation needed]

Later Years

Following a stroke in 1944, Maurin began to lose his memory and his condition deteriorated until he died in 1949 at the Catholic Worker's Maryfarm near Newburgh, New York. The Staten Island Catholic Worker farm was named after Maurin following his death;[9] it currently operates in Marlboro, New York.[citation needed]

Intellectual Influences

According to Dorothy Day, some of the books he had her read were the works of "Fr. Vincent McNabb and Eric Gill, Jacques Maritain, Leon Bloy, Charles Peguy of France, Don Sturzo of Italy, (Romano) Guardini and Karl Adam of Germany, and (Nicholas) Berdyaev of Russia."[10] Among the writers who gave substance to Maurin's ideas were Peter Kropotkin, Léon Bloy and Emmanuel Mounier.[11][12]

The following books were recommended repeatedly by Peter Maurin In reading lists appended to his essays.[13]

  1. Art in a Changing Civilization, Eric Gill
  2. Bourgeois Mind, The, Nicholas Berdyaev
  3. Brotherhood Economics, Toyohiko Kagawa
  4. Charles V, Wyndham Lewis
  5. Catholicism, Protestantism and Capitalism, Amintore Fanfani
  6. Christianity and Class War, Nicholas Berdyaev
  7. Church and the Land, The, Father Vincent McNabb, O.P.
  8. Discourse on Usury, Thomas Wilson
  9. Emancipation of a Free Thinker, The, Herbert E. Cory
  10. Enquiries Into Religion and Culture, Christopher Dawson
  11. Fields, Factories and Workshops, Peter Kropotkin
  12. Fire on the Earth, Paul Hanly Furfey
  13. Flight From the City, The, Ralph Borsodi
  14. Franciscan Message to the World, The, Father Agostino Gemelli, F.M.
  15. Freedom in the Modern World, Jacques Maritain
  16. Future of Bolshevism, The, Waldemar Gurian
  17. Guildsman's Interpretation of History, A, Arthur Penty
  18. Great Commandment of the Gospel, The, His Excellency A. G. Cicognani, Apostolic Delegate to the U. S.
  19. Ireland and the Foundation of Europe, Benedict Fitzpatrick
  20. I Take My Stand, by Twelve Southern Agrarians
  21. Land of the Free, The, Herbert Agar
  22. Lord of the World, Robert Hugh Benson
  23. Making of Europe, The, Christopher Dawson
  24. Man the Unknown, Dr. Alexis Carrel
  25. Nations Can Stay at Home, B. O. Wilcox
  26. Nazareth or Social Chaos, Father Vincent McNabb, O.P.
  27. Our Enemy the State, Albert Jay Nock
  28. Outline of Sanity, G. K. Chesterton
  29. Personalist Manifesto, Emmanuel Mounier
  30. Philosophy of Work, A, Etienne Borne
  31. Post-Industrialism, Arthur Penty
  32. Progress and Religion, Christopher Dawson
  33. Religion and the Modern State, Christopher Dawson
  34. Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, R. H. Tawney
  35. Revolution Personnaliste et Communautaire (La), Emmanuel Mounier
  36. Saint Francis of Assist, G. K. Chesterton
  37. Social Principles of the Gospel, Alphonse Lugan
  38. Soviet Man Now, Helen Iswolsky
  39. Temporal Regime and Liberty, Jacques Maritain
  40. Theory of the Leisure Class, The, Thorstein Veblen
  41. Thomistic Doctrine of the Common Good, The, Seraphine Michel
  42. Things That Are Not Caesar's, Jacques Maritain
  43. Toward a Christian Sociology, Arthur Penty
  44. True Humanism, Jacques Maritain
  45. Two Nations, The, Christopher Hollis
  46. Unfinished Universe, The, T. S. Gregory
  47. Valerian Persecution, The, Father Patrick Healy
  48. What Man Has Made of Man, Mortimer Adler
  49. Work and Leisure, Eric Gill

Legacy

Maurin was played by Martin Sheen in Entertaining Angels: The Dorothy Day Story[14]. His contributions to the Catholic Worker Movement, while apparently often eclipsed in the collective memory of the movement by those of Dorothy Day,[15] remain foundational, as evidenced by Day's insistence in The Long Loneliness and elsewhere that she would never have begun the Catholic Worker without him.

See also

References

  1. ^ Coy, Patrick G. (1988). A Revolution of the heart: essays on the Catholic worker. Temple University Press. pp. 16–23. Peter Maurin
  2. ^ Day, Dorothy (1963). Loaves and Fishes: The inspiring story of the Catholic Worker Movement. Orbis Books. p. 5. A Knock at the Door
  3. ^ Sheehan, Arthur. Peter Maurin: Gay Believer. Garden City, NY: Hanover House, 1959. pg. 52-69; 205.
  4. ^ Day, Dorothy. "Peter Maurin, 1877-1977," The Catholic Worker, May 1977, 1,9. Article available online at Catholicworker.org, http://www.catholicworker.org/dorothyday/daytext.cfm?TextID=256&SearchTerm=peter%20maurin%201877-1977, and Catholicworker.com, http://www.catholicworker.com/cwo003.htm Retrieved 7 Jan 2009
  5. ^ Forest, Jim. "Peter Maurin". Retrieved April 27, 2008 (biographical essay) from catholicworker.com. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  6. ^ Day, Dorothy. "Peter Maurin 1877-1977," The Catholic Worker, May 1977, p. 1, 9. Article available online at Catholicworker.org, http://www.catholicworker.org/dorothyday/daytext.cfm?TextID=256&SearchTerm=peter%20maurin%201877-1977, and Catholicworker.com, http://www.catholicworker.com/cwo003.htm Retrieved 7 Jan 2009
  7. ^ Coy, Patrick G. (1988). A Revolution of the heart: essays on the Catholic worker. Temple University Press. pp. 19–21. The influence of Francis of Assisi in Maurin's life was considerable.
  8. ^ Ellis, Marc H. Peter Maurin: Prophet in the Twentieth Century. New York: Paulist Press, 1981. p. 34-35
  9. ^ Miller, William D. Dorothy Day: A Biography. San Francisco: Harper & Rowe, 1982. p. 413-417
  10. ^ Miller, William D. Dorothy Day: A Biography. San Francisco: Harper & Rowe, 1982. p. 234
  11. ^ {{cite book|title=Peter Maurin: Apostle to the World|author=Dorothy Day|page=33|date=2004|quote=Among the writers who gave substance to Maurin's ideas were Russian anarchist Peter Kropotkin, the French novelist Léon Bloy, and the personalist philosopher Emmanuel Mounier
  12. ^ Zwick, Mark, and Louise Zwick. "Roots of the Catholic Worker Movement: Emmanuel Mounier, Personalism, and the Catholic Worker movement".from Casa Juan Diego, i.e., The Houston Catholic Worker, July/August 1999
  13. ^ Maurin, Peter. "Catholic Radicalism: Phrased Essays For The Green Revolution" (PDF). Retrieved August 14, 2011 (.pdf of book; book includes explicit repudiation of copyright) from www.walsh.edu. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help). New York: Catholic Worker Books. 1949. pg. 207.
  14. ^ "Entertaining Angels: The Dorothy Day Story (1996)".
  15. ^ Paul Magno, ""Why Peter Maurin Matters"".

Bibliography

  • Ellis, Marc H. Peter Maurin: Prophet in the Twentieth Century. New York: Paulist Press, 1981
  • Day, Dorothy. “Maurin, Aristide Peter.” New Catholic Encyclopedia. 2nd ed. 2003.
  • Day, Dorothy and Sicius, Francis J. (ed), Peter Maurin: Apostle to the World. Marynoll: Orbis Books, 2004.
  • Maurin, Peter. Catholic Radicalism: Phrased Essays For The Green Revolution. New York: Catholic Worker Books. 1949.
  • Maurin, Peter. Easy Essays. Catholic Worker Reprint Series. Wipf & Stock Publishers. 2010.
  • Maurin, Peter. The Green Revolution: Easy Essays on Catholic Radicalism. Academy Guild Press. 1961.
  • Peter Maurin Biography and Photos
  • Template:Worldcat id
  • Sheehan, Arthur. Peter Maurin: Gay Believer. Garden City, NY: Hanover House, 1959.

External links

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