The Dorothy Day takes to New York Harbor

On Friday, the city officially commissioned the newest member of the Staten Island Ferry fleet — the Dorothy Day. 

The $85 million state-of-the-art ferry is named for Day, the activist and journalist with ties to the Lower East Side, where she worked with the poor and founded The Catholic Worker. (The St. Joseph's House is on First Street and Maryhouse on Third Street.) 

City officials said that Day regularly rode the Staten Island Ferry to reach her cottage on Staten Island's South Shore and is buried in Pleasant Plains. According to officials, the ferry will serve passengers for the first time later this year.

Today we officially commissioned the Dorothy Day, the third and final new Ollis-class #StatenIslandFerry. The $85 million state-of-the-art ferry is named for Day, the legendary 20th-century Catholic peace activist who lived and worked #onStatenIsland. pic.twitter.com/i1fC0I6mJG

— NYC DOT (@NYC_DOT) November 4, 2022

Dorothy Day (1897-1980) was a convert to Catholicism who led the Catholic Worker movement. Day has been submitted to the Vatican as a candidate for canonization by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

📷: Day's granddaughter joined us for the Commissioning Ceremony pic.twitter.com/b5m9AFHJ2m

— NYC DOT (@NYC_DOT) November 4, 2022

Meanwhile, here's a video of the launch and sea trial from September ...

   

The Church of the Nativity at 44 Second Ave. between Second Street and Third Street was Day's home parish. Several years ago, parishioners asked the Archdiocese of New York to build a shrine for Day within Nativity. 

The Archdiocese later sold the property to developers, who demolished the church and neighboring structures to make way for an 11-floor mixed-use building that will rise on the east side of the avenue ...

Top image via Eastern Shipbuilding Group, Inc./Nativity lot photo by Felton Davis

[Updated] 1 wedding and a demolition

As reported on Thursday, workers are demolishing the deconsecrated and shuttered (as of July 2015) Church of the Nativity at 44 Second Ave. between Second Street and Third Street. 

EVG reader Leo points us to a photo now displayed on the plywood outside the church... showing a wedding there from June 2007...

We're told that this is Tanya Theriault and Matt Vogel, two former Maryhouse volunteers who now live in New Orleans with their family. Father George Anderson, who died in 2020 at age 86, performed the ceremonies. 

Thank you Felton Davis!

Updated 4/3 

Someone removed the wedding photo... so Felton Davis put up a new photo on the plywood... a shot of Dorothy Day at the entrance to Nativity Church, circa 1978 ...

Standing next to the photo — Day's granddaughter, Martha Hennessy. 

Previously on EV Grieve: 

• Remembering Dorothy Day, with a call for a shrine in her honor on 2nd Avenue

Remembering Dorothy Day, with a call for a shrine in her honor on 2nd Avenue

Tonight at 6, the Church of the Nativity is holding a special mass in honor of Dorothy Day at 44 Second Ave. between East Second Street and East Third Street.

Day was a journalist and social and political activist in the Lower East Side where she worked with the poor and founded The Catholic Worker. Today the Church refers to her as a "Servant of God" as the canonization process has begun.

Day's granddaughter, Martha Hennessey, will share readings from Dorothy's writings throughout the service. She will also talk about the parish's request for a Dorothy Day shrine after the mass, outside of the church.

The Church of the Nativity is slated close Aug. 1. After months of fighting the archdiocese for a chance to appeal, parishioners are now asking the Archdiocese to build a shrine for Dorothy Day within Nativity, or to build a chapel/retreat center within the new building should the church be demolished. Nativity was the parish of Dorothy Day.

The New York Times has more on this in an article from Monday titled Invoking the Radical Spirit of Dorothy Day to Fight a Church Closing.

The expected closure comes amidst a massive reorganization of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York.

Under the plan, the church, founded in 1832, would merge with Most Holy Redeemer on East Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B.

The conventional wisdom is that the Archdiocese will sell the property for retail-residential development.

One passer-by told the Times: "If you ask me, I think they’re trying to close it to make a high-rise condo so they can bring more money to the neighborhood."

And we've heard from people who figure the block from the church to East Second Street will eventually all be luxury housing…



As for Dorothy Day, here's more from here granddaughter in the Times:

Ms. Hennessy, who lives nearby at the Catholic Worker’s Maryhouse when she is in New York, said she felt “a disconnect” between the drive to canonize her grandmother and the decision to close her church. She said she hoped a way could be found to honor Day and her legacy, perhaps using the vacant rectory building, if not the church itself.

"In the East Village, with all the affluence, the party atmosphere and the materialism, we still have poverty," Ms. Hennessy said. "They are doing their best to hide it, but if there was a shrine dedicated to the history of her work, that might be more helpful. It would raise the question of economic refugees."

Previously on EV Grieve:
Parishioners fight to save the Church of the Nativity on 2nd Avenue