Catholic Worker Teaching Guide: 1940s

The 1940s were a busy time for the Catholic Worker movement and the periodical offers a clear record of that. World War II was, as it was across the United States, a major part of the first half of the decade for the Catholic Worker. The Catholic Worker frequently acted as a voice for peace and for ending the draft. With the end of the WWII, the Catholic Worker began to decry the emergence of nuclear weapons and would regularly mourn the mass deaths at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The call for the elimination of nuclear weapons would become a regular feature of the Catholic Worker into the future. The decade would end with the deaths of its co-founder Peter Maurin but the Catholic Worker would continue to work to keep his legacy alive for decades to come. 

Common elements of the Catholic Worker during the 1940s were the personal reflections of Dorothy and the "Easy Essays," poems written by Peter Maurin. Another regular contribution from Peter Maurin were his writings about what was happening at his farm.