Another look at our radical church teachings on labor

Labor Day serves as a good reminder that we belong to a radical church. Our Church preaches radical teachings about labor. We believe, among other things, in the right and duty to work, the right to economic initiative, the right to work in safe conditions for fair wages, and the right to organize and join associations to secure these rights.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church states: "Work is a duty. Work honors the Creator’s gifts and the talents received from him. By enduring the hardship of work in union with Jesus, the carpenter of Nazareth … man collaborates in a certain fashion with the son of God in his redemptive work. He shows himself to be a disciple of Christ by carrying the cross, daily, in the work he is called to accomplish." In other words, we do not work alone; we work with and for God.

Like his predecessors, Blessed Pope John Paul II stressed Church teaching on the importance of work, noting that, "Man must work both because the Creator has commanded it and because of his own humanity, which requires work in order to be maintained and developed. Man must work out of regard for others, especially his own family, but also for the society he belongs to, the country of which he is a child, and the whole human family of which he is a member. ..." [Emphasis added]. In other words, we do not work for ourselves alone, but as part of a greater good.

Our radical faith teaches that every person has a right to live a life of dignity with ample food, clean water, stable housing, and access to health care, education, and employment, regardless of where we live. The Catechism teaches that our wages must be adequate to afford these basic necessities. Our Church does not promote a specific minimum wage, but it expects businesses to ensure that workers are fairly compensated. In the Catholic perspective, that means workers would not need two or three jobs to meet the basic needs of any family.

The Church’s social doctrine lists additional work-related rights that promote human dignity: the right to rest from work, the right to be who you are at work without being bullied or harassed, the right to appropriate subsidies to provide for the unemployed and their families, the right to a pension, and to insurance for old age, sickness, and work-related accidents. For the Catholic Church, these are not U.S. specific protections; these are universal rights, inherent in our status as human beings.

We workers have a role to play in ensuring workers’ rights as well. As members of one global human family, we must consider what happens when we fail to do our share of the work or use more of the family’s resources than we should. Within our global family, we need to work in ways that do not overuse the world’s resources, leaving someone else to suffer.

And our radical Church sees a role for government as well. Government must help protect the dignity of workers, adopt policies that promote full employment and fair pay and work with other countries to protect the right to work globally.

All workers, everywhere, share the same rights. And all Catholics are called to advocate for the rights of workers, whether in letters to our congressmen or through the power of our wallets (the social doctrine of the Church tells us that if we wouldn’t buy from a company that exploits U.S. workers, we shouldn’t buy from one that exploits workers in or from other countries).

In our Church, we understand that our goal in work is more than just a paycheck, it is to do God’s will. So go to your work, no matter how lofty or mundane it might seem, knowing that you are a radical Catholic worker, acting in a very real alliance with God for the benefit of workers everywhere.