The Importance of Work and the Sancitifcation of Daily Life

Last time we noted a book written by Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski: All You Who Labor: Work and the Sanctification of Daily Life. After talking about the author as a good example for us working Catholic men to follow, today we'll look at the book itself. But first, we found an updated version of the book re-titled Working Your Way Into Heaven: How to Make Work, Stress, and Drudgery a Means to Your Sanctity. Same book, different title and cover. We're guessing the original version's out of print, so you'll likely have to buy this new one if interested.

But whatever the title, here are some salient comments about the content from a review by David Scott. He addresses the common perception that work and the spiritual life are separate spheres that hardly meet. That's a theme we've addressed many times. And as we've pointed out, many spiritual writers and saints have addressed it too. Mr. Scott notes, however that very few take this idea seriously. As he puts it: "...few of us see our work as an essential part of who we are. Whether we are workaholics or work shirkers, we see work as necessary for survival, but divorced from and usually an obstacle to our “life.” Turning to Cardinal Wyszynski, Mr. Scott wants to understand why this is the case. The meat of Wyszynski's teachings about work are beautifully outlined thusly:

Cardinal Wyszynski believes that, as Job put it, human beings are made to work, not only out of need, but as part of God’s plan.

Meditating on Psalm 104, Cardinal Wyszynski describes God’s plan in glorious prose: “It is God by the power of his will who carves out the valleys and mountain crevices, who spreads out the fertile fields like carpets, snatches the waters of the sea up to the heavens and rains them as dew onto the harvests of the earth. It is God’s thought that forms the face of the earth in a wonderful way, ornamenting it with the flashes of his beauty.”

The cardinal grounds his spirituality of work in God’s finest work—the creation of people in his own image. We are, by our very nature, meant to work in imitation of our Creator, as “co-workers” in God’s work of redeeming the world.

And if you've read any of our posts over the years, you'll recognize this:

The key to the cardinal’s spirituality of work is the motives, the intentions that lie behind our work. Perhaps right now we work for the mortgage or the kids’ tuition. But Cardinal Wyszynski would have us change our motives, to do everything, even the most menial of our tasks, “out of love for God.”

“The smallest act can be sanctified by the intention that inspires it; it can bring merit with it and redemption, if its motive is the love of God,” Cardinal Wyszynski instructs. “The value of human acts comes from the intention behind them. The lowest work can, through love, raise up to the heights of holiness, while the loftiest work, when it is performed without love, lowers and damns one.”

We plan to bring you more of the great Cardinal's specific ideas about work in future posts, but for now, let's give Mr. Scott the final word today:

Cardinal Wyszynski reminds us that nobody—whether we be wage earners or profiteers—is made only for consumption and production. We are, in reality, works of God in progress, and our own work—our very existence—is to become blessed.