Labor Day homily

In the summer of 2008, I was transferred to our four-parish cluster in Northern Mississippi. By late October, I felt it was my responsibility to inform our parishioners about their Catholic tradition in light of the upcoming presidential election. As part of my homily, I read the seven points from the US Bishops' document "Faithful Citizenship":  life and dignity of the human person, call to family, community, and participation, rights and responsibilities, option for the poor and vulnerable, dignity of work and rights of workers, solidarity,  respect for God's creation.

After the Mass, one man came up to me and angrily stated: "I never thought I would hear the Democratic party platform read from the pulpit!" Others complained to the pastor, who in turn advised me that the homily was not the place for such announcements.

As I prepared my homily for Labor Day this year, I picked up a copy of my favorite encyclical of Pope John Paul's: "Laborem Exercens" (On Human Work) and wistfully thought that if I were to return to that same congregation and begin reading from the beloved Pope's teaching, I would get the same reaction. It's too easy for us to pick and choose among church teachings.

Yet the Church is truly catholic -- vast and varied. This struck me as I selected readings for the Labor Day mass. The Lectionary offers two options for each reading, and they could not be more different.

The first reading offers two versions of the creation story from Genesis. One gives mankind "dominion" over creation. The command is to "fill the earth and subdue it." The other simply states that man(kind) was placed in the garden "to cultivate and care for it." Wow! What different attitudes toward creation!

The choices for the second reading suggest that Paul did not theologize much about work. He saw it as a simple necessity of life: "one unwilling to work, should not eat."  Obviously a statement with social implications.

In the Gospel readings, we see the greatest contrast of all. In the first, Jesus tells his followers to trust in God's providence, and "do not worry about tomorrow." In the second option, we have the parable of the talents, where the third servant, who had done nothing wrong except bury his talent, had his talent taken away, and was thrown outside "where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth." This is a parable even Ayn Rand could approve of.

With such a disparity of teachings in scripture, it is necessary for the Church to amplify and clarify what the tradition is communicating to us, and since 1891, there has been a regular stream of encyclicals and other statements to do just this. It is also true that "the social justice teaching of the Church is its best-kept secret." One of the difficulties is that this area does not lend itself to black-and-white absolute statements. Even at the beginning of his pontificate, while the Soviet Union was still alive and well, Pope John Paul saw the need of a path distinct from communism and capitalism, since both of them were materialistic in nature. Middle paths do not generate the same moral fervor as extreme ones, so the Church's stand on economic issues has always received a tepid response.

My enthusiasm for "Laborem Exercens" comes from the Pope's insistence on the spiritual value of human work. In my own words, this makes mankind a "sacrament" to creation, to continue to transform it and help bring it to perfection. He consistently returns to this theme, to avoid the temptation to look at work, and the economy in general, as materialistic realities, governed by mechanical laws.

John Paul puts great emphasis on the respect for the human person. He claims that every worker is a free subject, an agent, not a passive object. With this in mind, he can confidently state that work which does not involve the creativity and free will of the worker cannot be considered worthy of human beings. He goes on to endorse labor unions and associations, and also worker participation in the management of enterprises. He makes the bald statement that "labor has priority over capital." I would be interested in knowing what percentage of Catholics would endorse that view.

In the larger economic sense, he reminds us that in the Catholic tradition, the right to property is not absolute -- it is conditioned by the need to promote the common good. This statement alone would get the Pope tossed out of a lot of churches. Several years later, the US bishops would state that "the economy exists for people, not people for the economy." Such shocking statements can come and go without making much of an impact on society. Moral indignation over economic injustices has ebbed since the 1980's. Will it return?