Dorothy Day was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 journalist, social activist and devout Catholic convert; she advocated the Catholic economic theory of Distributism

Distributism

Distributism is a third-way economic philosophy formulated by such Catholic thinkers as G. K...

. She was also considered to be an anarchist

Christian anarchism

Christian anarchism is a movement in political theology that combines anarchism and Christianity. It is the belief that there is only one source of authority to which Christians are ultimately answerable, the authority of God as embodied in the teachings of Jesus...

, and did not hesitate to use the term. In the 1930s, Day worked closely with fellow activist Peter Maurin

Peter Maurin

Peter Maurin was a Roman Catholic social activist who founded the Catholic Worker Movement in 1933 with Dorothy Day.Maurin expressed his ideas through short pieces of verse that became known as - Biography :...

 to establish the Catholic Worker movement

Catholic Worker Movement

The Catholic Worker Movement is a collection of autonomous communities of Catholics and their associates founded by Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin in 1933. Its aim is to "live in accordance with the justice and charity of Jesus Christ." One of its guiding principles is hospitality towards those on...

, a nonviolent, pacifist movement that continues to combine direct aid for the poor and homeless with nonviolent direct action on their behalf.

Day's cause for canonization

Canonization

Canonization is the act by which a Christian church declares a deceased person to be a saint, upon which declaration the person is included in the canon, or list, of recognized saints. Originally, individuals were recognized as saints without any formal process...

 is open in the Catholic Church.
Dorothy Day was born in the Brooklyn Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn

Brooklyn

Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...

, New York

New York

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

, and raised in San Francisco

San Francisco, California

San Francisco , officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the financial, cultural, and transportation center of the San Francisco Bay Area, a region of 7.15 million people which includes San Jose and Oakland...

 and Chicago.