LABOREM EXERCENS – ON HUMAN WORK

 

LABOREM EXERCENS – ON HUMAN WORK

The first papal encyclical I read was as a student at Villanova.  My academic focus was on French and Economics but the university required that I take three religion courses.  To partially fulfill the requirement I chose to take a course on Catholic social justice.  The professor required each of the students to study a subject and give a presentation on it to the class.  I was not Catholic at the time but was a committed Christian and a believer in capitalism.  I admired Pope John Paul II, who grew up under communism in Poland and was an opponent of it.  I chose to do a presentation on Laborem Exercens.  This was one of the pope’s first encyclicals, which commemorated the ninetieth anniversary of Pope Leo XIII’s innovative encyclical Rerum Novarum, On Capital and Labor.  This is the founding document of what has become known as Catholic social teaching.

I was overwhelmed by what I read, how the pope incorporated Scripture, traditional Christian ideas about the organization of society, and how they might address emerging issues in the world today.  What the Holy Father promulgated on September 14, 1981, on the Feast of the Holy Cross, still has a lot to say to us today, although the international situation is very different.  Communism no longer rules over Russia and Eastern Europe, and the rapid advancement in technology and its availability to consumers has caused radical changes.  Asia is rising and is more important than ever to the commerce of the world.  Despite changes, which the Holy Father notes are inevitable, the truth about the nature and value of labor, and the nature and value of the human being, will never change.  The Church believes that what the New Testament teaches about work, and what the Old Testament teaches about justice in human exchanges, is still applicable, and she has incorporated this into her social teaching.  For the sake of human flourishing these principles must guide our approach to labor, and we must always keep in mind the dignity of the subject of labor, the human being, each of whom is created in the image and likeness of God. 

Pope John Paul II writes in Laborem Exercens that “It is not for the Church to analyze scientifically the consequences that these changes may have on human society. But the Church considers it her task always to call attention to the dignity and rights of those who work, to condemn situations in which that dignity and those rights are violated, and to help to guide the above-mentioned changes so as to ensure authentic progress by man and society.”  The economy and social conditions in every place and nation in the world must have as its ultimate goal the well-being of all the people.  Progress and prosperity should not be limited to a few but should lift up everyone.  Where this is achieved the world is more at peace. 

From the beginning God intended for human beings to work: “The Lord God took the man and settled him in the Garden of Eden, to cultivate and care for it” (Genesis 2:15).  Every man and woman has a right and a duty to work.  Adam and Eve and their descendants were meant to work and provide for themselves.  In Eden the task was enjoyable, but when Adam and Eve sinned and were expelled from Eden it became difficult.  God said to Adam, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth to you; and you shall eat the plants of the field.  In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you will return” (Gen 3:17-19). 

Despite its hardship, the ability to work remains a gift of God.  By it human beings are sustained, they provide and care for one another, and they discover a sense of fulfillment and accomplishment.  There is also a spiritual dimension to work.  Work has more value to it than simply gaining a living or providing the means to live comfortably.  The Christian approach to it is much more profound, which we might expect since all that the Christian does has the goal of serving God and advancing him or her on the way to heaven.  I will follow up on this subject in the next few articles.  Meanwhile, Happy Labor Day!