Labor Day, USA -- 2018

Lectionary: 431​

Rolling up the scroll, he handed it back to the attendant and sat down, and the eyes of all in the synagogue looked intently at him. He said to them, "Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing."

The scriptures show some ambivalence about work. On the one hand we see the Lord working for six days to build the world. He reflects his great satisfaction in the work as he says at the end of each day, "That's good!" The first man and woman worked in Eden with similar satisfaction, turning a wilderness into a Garden. 

On the other hand, following their sin, God is disappointed and the man's work and a woman's labor are cursed.

From ancient times, in a world polluted with sin, work is what slaves do. Ancient people and kingdoms did not hesitate to invade their neighbors in search of cheap labor. It's a way of organizing human labor; not spiritually satisfying, certainly; but it worked for those with the power to enforce it. Most people living under the Roman empire were slaves. African slaves imported to South American plantations to grow and manufacture sugar were expected to live ten years. Given the willingness of African rulers to sell their enemies and the low cost of transport, the business was profitable. The United States, according to Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, developed one of the most barbaric forms of slavery in human history. We have yet to atone for that tragic story.

In our Christian tradition, Saint Benedict urged his monks "Ora et labora!" Work and pray! He saw work as a satisfying way to pursue the life of holiness. A well-organized monastery didn't require long hours of its monks. Four hours a day might suffice during the off season; longer hours, during the planting and sowing seasons. But they completed the sacred work of worship consistently throughout the year.

The Protestant Reformation picked up that positive spirituality, despite Luther's doctrine that the Lord saves by faith and not by works. Americans, in particular, are known for their "Protestant work ethic." We assume that working people are better than idlers; many people despise welfare and welfare recipients. Even those who were born with every advantage of wealth, connections and education will claim they "worked hard" to attain their life of ease. One investment company went so far as to boast of their "old-fashioned" way of making money, "We work for it!"

As if...!

Labor Day doesn't celebrate the privileged life of investors. It's about the right of workers to organize and participate fully in economic decisions that affect them. The Church formally entered the discussion when Pope Leo XIII published his encyclical, Rerum Novarum. He taught that a factory worker should enjoy the fruit of his labor just as a farmer may live off the land he owns. Papal support of organized labor was greeted with scorn by Wall Street and capitalists but greeted by the priests who lived among factory workers. Later church teaching would discourage child labor and promote safer working conditions.

Popes Saint John XXIII and Saint John Paul II also wrote important encyclicals reflecting on the right and dignity of work. John Paul II, especially, worried that human labor is not just a commodity like bales of hay and gallons of milk. Justice does not buy labor in the cheapest markets and sell it at the highest possible rate. Human beings are not disposable.

That "right to work" was embraced in Communist countries though the United States never accepted the principle. Oddly, the expression "right to work" has been co-opted and is now used to discourage organized labor.

So long as there are people on this planet we will struggle to create an economic system that appreciates and rewards human labor. There will always be complex forces tugging this way and pulling that way, representing different factions and philosophies. Every political and economic system will be challenged by corruption on the one hand; and the gospel, on the other. The end will never be in sight.

We can pray that the Church will continue to support the rights of all people and the dignity of work until the Lord himself assigns us to our work stations in a newer, updated version of the Garden of Eden.