WASHINGTON (CNA) — Work has dignity because it participates in God’s creation and builds up the common good, the U.S. bishops said in their annual Labor Day statement. They called for shared sacrifices to heal the country, while recognizing the rights of workers and the stark facts of unemployment, poverty and insecurity.
“An economy that cannot provide employment, decent wages and benefits, and a sense of participation and ownership for its workers is broken in fundamental ways,” said Bishop Stephen Blaire of Stockton, Calif., in the letter.
The chair of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development emphasized the suffering of those in difficult situations.
“This Labor Day we need to look beyond the economic indicators, stock-market gyrations and political conflicts and focus on the often invisible burdens of ordinary workers and their families, many of whom are hurting, discouraged, and left behind by this economy.”
He urged Christian virtue in carrying out work and in considering the situation of others.
“We must remember that at the heart of everything we do as believers must be love, for it is love which honors the dignity of work as participation in the act of God’s creation, and it is love which values the dignity of the worker, not just for the work he or she does, but above all for the person he or she is.”
Bishop Blaire invoked Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical Rerum Novarum, calling it the “cornerstone” for more than a century of Catholic social teaching.
That encyclical “lifted up the dignity of the worker in the midst of massive economic changes.”
“Pope Leo’s powerful letter rejected both unbridled capitalism that could strip workers of their God-given human dignity and dangerous socialism that could empower the state over all else in ways that destroy human initiative,” the bishop said.
“In Catholic teaching, work has an inherent dignity because work helps us not only to meet our needs and provide for our families, but also to share in God’s creation and contribute to the common good. People need work not only to pay bills, put food on the table, and stay in their homes, but also to express their human dignity and to enrich and strengthen the larger community.”
Pope Leo XII taught that there is a natural right to join a union that the government must protect. Pope Leo’s successors, like John Paul II and Benedict XVI, have reaffirmed this right.
“Our Church continues to teach that unions remain an effective instrument to protect the dignity of work and the rights of workers,” Bishop Blaire said, noting efforts to remove or restrict the bargaining rights of workers and to limit their role in the workplace.
“Bishops in Wisconsin, Ohio and elsewhere have faithfully and carefully outlined Catholic teaching on worker rights, suggesting that difficult times should not lead us to ignore the legitimate rights of workers,” he added.
“Without endorsing every tactic of unions or every outcome of collective bargaining, the Church affirms the rights of workers in public and private employment to choose to come together to form and join unions, to bargain collectively, and to have an effective voice in the workplace.”
Some unions have taken positions the Church cannot support. These differences should be addressed through respectful dialogue, he suggested.
The Labor Day letter pointed to national problems like unemployment, child poverty, student-loan debt, income inequality, economic stagnation and “unsustainable deficits and growing debt that will burden our children for decades to come.”
These problems have an ethical dimension. Some institutions sought short-term gain without regard to long-term consequences, while some individuals made “irresponsible choices” and let their “greed and envy” exceed their financial capacity.
However, the bishop criticized “too much finger pointing,” the “unfair” blame of immigrants, and the demonization of either the market or the government as the source of all economic problems.
He urged Americans to respect the various roles of economic life and to “avoid challenging the motives of others.”
“We can understand and act like we are part of one economy, one nation, and one human family. We can acknowledge our responsibility for the ways, large or small, we contributed to this crisis,” Bishop Blaire advised.
“We can look for common ground and seek the common good. We can encourage all the institutions in our society to work together to reduce joblessness, promote economic growth, overcome poverty, increase prosperity, and make the shared sacrifices and even compromises necessary to begin to heal our broken economy.”
Edward Pentin: Pope Writes Op-Ed on Meaning of Christmas
Joseph Pronechen: Bishops Call for 'Rosary Novena for Life and Liberty'
Comments
Post a Comment
You would think that all employees employeed by Catholic Schools, Parishes, etc. would have the right to un-employment benifits. My wife was just fired from our Parish school, reasons unknowned, and isn’t elligable for unemployment. It seems that unemployment benefits is an option for religious groups. Now that’s Justice!!! We need a mandate requiring Catholic groups to provide unemployment benefite to it’s employees.
The most important thing for workers is a roaring economy which offers plentiful employment opportunities and where competition ensures good wages. While I applaud the bishops in speaking out for workers they too often espouse economic principles which are counter to good economic growth. It is good that they cite “rerum novarum” and its condemnation against “dangerous socialism”. However they fail to recognize the socialist policies of the current administration, mirrored after those of Europe, which along with outrageous deficit spending are destroying our economy as evidenced by the puny 1% growth in the last quarter.
They of course emphasize the right of workers to join a union. Agreed, but they also have a right to not join a union, especially one that spends their dues money on causes with which they disagree. They need to make their statements much less partisan politicaly. I recently reread a comment from Andrew Greely in an article wherein he said, there seems to be a pedagogical law that the taught will not listen to the teachers unless they believe that the teachers have first listened to them. I don’t believe that the bishops have listened to the people of God before they wrote that.
Steve, if your wife was fired, she may not be eligible for unemployment for that reason, not because she worked for a Catholic school. Being fired (rather then being “let go” or downsized) is a cause for ineligibility in many situations. I pray for your family. No matter what the reason, it is a terrible situation for a family (and one I well know).
JEC - your last sentence sums up the problem with your analysis: “I don’t believe that the bishops have listened to the people of God before they wrote that.” In formulating and disseminating doctrine, the bishops listen to the Holy Spirit and then the people of God listen to the bishops. Even when we don’t like what they have to say. Maybe, ESPECIALLY, when we find their teachings challenging to our personal social or political views. At least, I find that true for myself.
Bishop Blaire needs a few lessons on talking about economics and job creation. Government make-work projects don’t solve any problems without thriving private enterprise and an over reaching socialistic public employee union organization should not be able to have the power to have an over reaching voice in the legislative arena that private sector workers and business owner can not counter. Government workers are rebaters of tax revnues—not a slam, just a fact. Government shovel ready projects are like paying people to dig holes and then fill them, as Milton Friedman once pointed out. Bishop Blaire likes to slam the stock market and economic indicators, but they tools for business people to gauge how to make responsible market decisions. The only way to provide more jobs for more people and provide for the common good is to have a thriving public sector. The Bishops needs a new point man. The business person trying to meet a payroll responsibly is as much a laborer as a longshoreman.
Of what use is this kind of letter? It tells us nothing about any issue of public importance. For example Do legislatures have the right to limit the bargaining power of certain kinds of unions, for example could soldiers unionize? Can police be allowed an unlimited right to strike? How about if physicians or health care workers formed unions? Should it be legal for them to go on strike? While some of these issues are only theoretical and some are actually matters of current public debate none of them can be answered by reference to the Bishops letter or Catholic social teaching in general. Most of the issues addressed by the social teaching have been settled, at least regarding unions. No candidate for public office of any party would dispute that workers have a right to join unions. A more germane question is whether they have a right not to do so. A current policy position is whether all workers have unlimited bargaining rights, that is do public employees who vote for their employers have an unlimited right to collective bargaining? How is this balanced against the need to protect their fellow citizens from unlimited and unsustainable taxation to support union demands. Regardless of where you stand on this question, their is nothing in Catholic social teaching that can answer it specifically.
Moreover the nonsense that we “need to seek common ground” suggests the Bishops misunderstand the nature of economic problems. They seem to believe that some sort of “middle ground” between liberalism and conservatism would be best for the economy. There is simply no empirical evidence for this. If someone believes only a radical departure from the current administrations policies will correct the current unemployment situation then their moral duty is not to “seek common ground” it is rather to convince their fellow citizens that they need to vote out of office the Democrats so that better economic policies can be put in place. Lets make it more concrete. If you are a democrat you think tax rates on high wage earners need to be raised to make things more “more fair” and raise more revenue for government projects, maybe you want a top rate of 40 %, If you are a conservative you would argue the rates need to be dropped to 28% to encourage private entrepreneurship and economic expansion, thus decreasing unemployment. Leave aside the issue of whose theory is correct. To seek common ground and say pick a marginal tax rate of 34% may be totally useless, as it may be too low to adequately raise the revenues the left seeks, nor low enough to stimulate business activity. So “common ground” may be useless. There is nothing to specifically commend it. It just sounds nice. It fails to recognize that there are 2 incompatible theoretical frame works for dealing with political and economic issues that are fundamentally irreconcilable. That is why we hold elections. In terms of economic policy the issues are not dealt with by vague generic letters that will largely be ignored.
Sure would be nice if folks like JEC, instead of channeling Rush and Co. could tell us what policies of Obama’s are ‘socialist’. The right has a string of cliches they run through to defend their failed policies. Today, THIS is the economy we have after 30 years of union busting, bank deregulation and more power concentrated in the hands of Wall Street. THIS is what a conservative economic looks like. It wasn’t unions that bankrupted this country. It wasn’t unions that put millions out of work. It was the unbridled greed of hedgefund managers and the wealthy who used deregulation to destroy wealth. JEC loves class warfare as long as you never mention the word!
Will the bishops [or rather the bureaucrats who write such bromides] never learn to study the problems of an economy? Will they not address the problem of union leadership acting for its own benefit and against the benefit of the members? The problem in this instance is our old fault - greed. It is a subject which bishops are paid to address.
And likewise for banks and corporations. Those who run them are subject to the same failings as all human beings. The era when the Protestant ethic - such as personal honesty - informed bankers and businessmen has gone by. The bishops’ organization does not address this.
The creation of jobs is no easy matter. It is beyond the professional understanding of the hierarchy. They are plenty of jobs available, an abundance of them. But they are now mostly located in “third world” countries. Mr. Obama’s promises to create jobs are the words of a lawyer who believes words are a good substitute for actions. A government can only create government jobs, which are paid for by taxes raised on workers who have real jobs.
And for the unions, it appears that workers have voted with their feet. This is apparent in the latest efforts by union leadership to force workers to join unions, willy nilly. The current union leadership is a disgrace and a dishonor to those hard-working men and women who made the unions. That leadership has over-reached itself. One has but to consider their salaries.
The union of bishops and the Democratic party is of a bygone era. One has but to consider the number of “Catholic” leaders in that party who mock the bishops. And the timidity of the bishops in addressing their mockery.
I can’t help but wonder how many of the above commentary doesn’t reflect the successful tactics of wedge-politics moreso than the expression of legitimate complaints with the bishops. It wasn’t long ago ... last winter in fact, when just to support the public unions in Wisconsin would get back in return a bevy of replies reminding me and others in support of the unions that the unions had supported abortion, homosexuality, etc. Never mind that the unions were fighting for ALL OF US to have the same kinds of benefits and respect from their employers, be it the taxpayers or private employers ... those wedge words, abortion and homosexuality were thrown back in regular fashion.
Instead of creating an atmosphere where all voters should’ve been encouraged to ask out-loud, “Hey, why shouldn’t I be able to retire with a pension fund, fully paid health benefits,” NOPE, the very clever social dividers funded by the Brothers Koch, Karl Rove et al, pulled the old divide and conquer game quite well at the onset of the Wisconsin battle. Using wedge words and wedge issues to weasel the much larger and more pertinant LABOR-RELATED MATTER, the Right almost successfully weaseled Wisconsin’s publilc sector and by extension, all Badger State working people into caving into the selfish designs of the Kochs, Rove and the rest of that ilk.
ALthough Wisconsin’s bishops were (rightfully) holding their noses concerning the public unions’ stands on those wedge issues ... at least the bishops were far-reaching enough to recognize the game being played by the Right and Scott Walker, et al: Hence, this once sentence should remind us us of the necessity to stick to what’s really at hand in labor issues: the workers’ rights to earn a decent living so as to feed their families and not have their economic security yanked out from under them no thanks to selfish and shadowy special interests who’d sell out the American middle class in a heartbeat.
” . . . “Without endorsing every tactic of unions or every outcome of collective bargaining, the Church affirms the rights of workers in public and private employment to choose to come together to form and join unions, to bargain collectively, and to have an effective voice in the workplace.”
All of this talk of wedge issues miss the point.
First of all abortion is not a “wedge” issue. Abortion is as Vatican II called it a “unspeakable crime.” Blessed John Paul II called referred to abortion as a particularly serious form of murder, as he stated in Evangelium Vitae, “The moral gravity of procured abortion is apparent in all its truth if we recognize that we are dealing with murder” Those who promote the legalization of such grave crimes are guilty of grave injustice, again quoting, “In the case of an intrinsically unjust law, such as a law permitting abortion or euthanasia, it is therefore never licit to obey it, or to “take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or vote for it”
To the extent that people like Steven support Democrats you are guilty of complicity in an unspeakable crime and in fact murder. At least to the extent you take Vatican II and John Paul II seriously. I frankly would not want that on my conscience. It is absurd to say politicians who attempt to restore some measure of respect for human life and limit legalized murder are dealing with a wedge issue. In fact this is an issue of overriding importance. All Catholics morally must make this issue the first issue they consider.
Beyond this, the fact is it is not really relevant to this discussion who was responsible for the bad economy or what particular political- economic policies you hold. The larger point is that Catholic Social teaching can not tell us whether the policies of Bush or Obama or Fredrick Hayek or John Keynes are correct. It tells us we need to protect the common good and be especially mindful of the poor. One can plausibly argue Conservative economic policies are best for both. You might disagree. So be it. These are empirical questions. They are based on objective evidence, they can not be settled by reference to a specific Christian principle or moral law. I would argue some of the Bush policies were sound economically, others bad, and all of Obama’s disastrously bad. But this would really be an argument that I could make as easily as a Buddhist or an agnostic as a Catholic. Of course Obama’s economic policies are bad from a Catholic perspective, but this is based purely on the evidence of their economic effects. ( They are bad for the poor) Others are free to dispute this, but again they must rely on economic arguments and empirical evidence. My main point is not the effect of Obama’s policies however, it is to point out that this kind of question is not a moral question, and thus is not one the Bishops have competence to answer.
The Bishops bland and vague policy statements are not helpful. Indeed why should they be? The Bishops can tell us we have a duty to help the poor, they have no special insight into what specific economic policy helps the poor, at least not as Bishops. This would be just as true for any number of specific technical fields. They have no idea of the best method to build a bridge, treat cardiovascular disease or repair my car. These are all questions with moral aspects ( Engineers morally should build strong bridges, doctors should care for their patients, and mechanics should be diligent and fair with car repair.),The Bishops have a right and a duty to pronounce on our moral duties. They have a divine office that mandates they do so, but the specific technical aspects of how to satisfy the moral obligations in such cases are technical issues that it would be absurd for the Bishops to issue statements about.
At some level the Bishops realize this and thus the USCCB statements are usually bland, generic and to some extent “content less”. In contrast individual Bishops, when they address truly moral issues speak with more force and credibility
The Bishops support of the unions won’t last much longer once they finally realize what the unions of today have become. Hopefully they heard Hoffa’s speech yesterday, that’s our union of today. I was in a union for many years and was glad to get away from that atmosphere of greed and self centeredness. The auto bailout was basically a money laundry scheme and much of that money is now going back to Obama’s campaign.
Post a Comment
By submitting this form, you give The National Catholic Register permission to publish this comment. Comments will be published at our discretion, and may be edited for clarity and length. For best formatting, please limit your response to one paragraph and don't hit "enter" to force line breaks.