Calling all clergy! Stop being embarrassingly silent on worker justice

Last updated on: September 26, 2019 at 9:21 am by Clint Schnekloth

Calling all clergy! Stop being embarrassingly silent on worker justice 2019-09-26T09:21:45-05:00 Clint Schnekloth

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Everything that is revealed by the light is light. Therefore, it says, Wake up, sleeper! Get up from the dead, and Christ will shine on you. (Ephesians 5:14)

I wonder if we find ourselves in a new moment for worker justice. Community organizing has taken on a new aspect. #Blacklivesmatter matters, and has changed how we think about social movements in America. In the meantime, other social movements wonder how to gather the same kind of energy and voice #blacklivesmatter has gathered.

Periodically, somebody will chime in and remind anyone listening that the heart of the Civil Rights movement was workers’ rights. The very night before he was killed, Martin Luther King spoke to striking sanitation workers in Memphis, Tennessee

On 8 April, Coretta Scott King, along with other family members
and Ralph Abernathy, heads a silent march of 42,000 people
to support the Memphis sanitation workers’ strike and to honor King.

. He said: “We’ve got to give ourselves to this struggle until the end. Nothing would be more tragic than to stop at this point in Memphis. We’ve got to see it through” (King, “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop,” 217). MLK Jr. was in Memphis for worker justice. He was assassinated while speaking out for striking workers.

This isn’t to say that black lives and workers lives are vying for social justice space in a limited resource arena, only that sometimes we need to remember the intersection of everything, and in this case race matters and class matters are inextricably bound up with each other.

I wonder why so few clergy these days are speaking up for workers rights. Is it that moneyed interests have finally and successfully purchased the voice of religious leaders, co-opting them to such a degree they’ve gone unwittingly quiet? Have the liberal and progressive churches become too cozy in their middle class-ness?

I know in my own part of the world, dominated as it is by large poultry corporations, virtually no clergy spoke up when our local worker justice center published an extensive and damning report on the poultry industry (http://nwawjc.org/poultry-report/). Marches have organized spontaneously and repeatedly for tragedies like Orlando, and after police shootings, and more. But when poultry workers organize, predominately white congregations stay home, and worker voices are left by and large to speak up for themselves.

I wonder if corporate philanthropy is a big part of the problem. Not only does money now have a vote (after Citizens United), money also has powerful influence on perceptions of good being done in communities. Large corporations can often use the gifts they give away to disguise the abuse of workers. In fact they maximize profits on the backs of worker injustice so that they can give away even grants and gifts that burnish their reputation in the community.

This puts clergy in an awkward space. We’re supposed to celebrate philanthropy and give thanks for it. We encourage it. But if we listen to workers (which is itself difficult because worker voices are systematically silenced in our culture), we learn that the worker experience is very different than the mid-level or executive experience, and frankly, a lot of our white and middle-class churches have more members working in the corporate offices than on the lines.

So as we head towards Labor Day, we clergy have a big responsibility. We must become witnesses. We must listen to workers at every level, from the top to the bottom and everywhere in between. But then like MLK our job is to side with those who struggle, those working for justice.

Frankly, I’m tired of so much of the liberal Protestant clergy sitting comfortably on the sidelines and eating food handled by abused workers. We’ve got some work to do. Start by looking at the Labor in the Pulpit resources at Interfaith Worker Justice.

Uncategorized

Previous Post

July 22, 2016

Praying in the way of Jesus

Next Post

August 11, 2016 4 ways you can save the church now (and they're not what you think)

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category #blacklivesmatter advocacy Avengers baptisms Capitalism church growth clergy silence corporate ethics Creation Care Donald Trump elections Evangelicals Evangelism Friendship hermeneutics Immigration Intersex introverts Jesus Labor Liturgy Lutheran MLK Jr. New urbanism Pentecost philanthropy Poem political theology Post-program church Prayer private devotion Reformation Refugees sacraments Scripture Secularity Sin small church social media Sovereignty Trauma-Informed Theology travel Trump Uncategorized wealth white supremacy Workers worship Youth

Select a Month January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 January 2016 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 May 2014 March 2014 June 2013 January 2013 December 2011 December 2010 February 2005 February 2004

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Which book follows the Gospels in the New Testament?

Select your answer to see how you score.

1 Corinthians Acts Hebrews Romans

Books by This Author Books by Clint Schnekloth

See All Titles »