Leaders from the Lowell region and beyond are gathering this Sunday to honor the persecuted religious minorities in the Middle East. A growing number of local politicians and church representatives will meet at St. George Antiochian Orthodox Church in what promises to be the largest event of its kind in Lowell history.
Despite the impressive roster of attendees, the presiding pastor, Rev. Leonard Faris, insists that the focus will be on the victims. "None of the organizers want this event to be politicized. Politicians are welcome to come as private individuals, but I won't be introducing them or making their visit official."
Of all the modern examples of holiness, Dorothy Day may well be the most approachable. During her bohemian years, she had a number of affairs, an abortion, lived out of wedlock, attempted suicide twice, and became a radical socialist. But all the while she longed for deeper meaning, with an unquenchable desire to help the downtrodden.
Day was born in 1897 in Brooklyn, New York into a stable, middle class family. Although her Episcopalian parents were not churchgoers, they instilled in her a solid Protestant work ethic and a respect for scripture that she retained all her life. Her father, a journalist, moved the family to San Francisco in 1903. In the great earthquake of 1906, her father's newspaper plant was destroyed, and he was left unemployed. It was Dorothy's first encounter with misfortune, and seeing the misery of the people in the city left an indelible impression on the young girl.
