Fragments of My Life: A Memoir

Catherine Doherty’s enthralling personal autobiography

Catherine tells in her own words how she was born to wealth in pre-revolutionary Russia, raised among Arab children and pashas in Egypt, French students in Paris, and Russian peasants and aristocrats on her family estate. She shares how she dodged bullets as a nurse during World War I, barely survived the Russian Revolution, encountered poverty as a refugee and returned from her rags to riches in North America. Then finally, how she gave everything away to serve the poor.

She tells of her adventures as a magazine correspondent in pre-World War II Europe, as a leader in the U.S. Civil Rights movement, and as an internationally-renowned speaker and writer who dodged rotten eggs and tomatoes, calling for racial and economic justice, ecumenism, and an active role for lay people in the Church.

Then she goes on to how she fell in love with and married Eddie Doherty, Irish-American newspaperman, and how they together founded Madonna House Lay Apostolate, and became leaders in the development of new forms of Christian community and service in the world.

A journey into Catherine’s life, disclosing the mysteries of world events that shaped her life; the mysteries of her leadership; the mysteries of her marriage; and, most of all, the mysteries of God’s love.

Author Profile: Catherine Doherty

Catherine Doherty used her heritage as a Russian Christian as a matrix for responding to the needs of Christian life and work in the modern world. Her own personal pilgrimage led her to be “poor with the poor Christ” in the slums of Toronto and in Harlem; and later to the establishing of the world-wide Madonna House Apostolate (in 1947). A dedicated wife and mother, Catherine was also a prolific writer of hundreds of articles, a best-selling author of dozens of books, a renowned national speaker, and a pioneer of social justice. After emigrating to the U.S., Catherine became a Catholic and was very active, along with her husband Eddie, in the Byzantine Catholic Church in the U.S. and Canada. Catherine died in 1985 and her cause for sainthood has been opened and is progressing.

This audio presentation of Fragments of My Life is read by Helen Porthouse, a long-time member of the Madonna House Apostolate, and she brings with her a truly personal experience of Catherine's life and works. Her background in drama and deep love for audiobooks shines through in this touching and inspirational reading of Catherine's memoirs—Helen brings a sense of wonder and excitement to Catherine's life which will draw listeners onward from the first few paragraphs.

“This autobiography has a special, divinely-touched richness. It reads like an adventure novel. If this were nothing but pure fiction, it would still be extremely intriguing. But because it's all true, it goes beyond intriguing to become enthralling and inspiring.” — Larry Holley, The Pecos Benedictine