Fulton Sheen at Work - 6

Today we finish our series of Fulton Sheen's thoughts about work. All these are meant to spur our own thoughts and deepen our understanding and appreciation of the fundamental importance of work itself, as well as how we perform our tasks each day.

It's so easy to lose track of the spiritual when we're surrounded not only by the sensible world, but a world that hardly recognized God's Presence, never mind that mere fact that He is the Creator of "all this." One way to "recapture" the spiritual is through our work. It is, after all, something which occupies much of our time each day - for most of us the "prime hours" of the day, at least Monday through Friday. It is, therefore, crucial that we don't allow these hours to go by without God's Presence, at least an acknowledgment of it from time to time. Even better, we develop the habit suggested last time by Bishop Sheen to begin and end each task during our work day with some sort of prayer or recollection of God, offering up our efforts.

Rather than grumpily get out of bed each day, and reluctantly trudge off to work each day, we can pursue our work in this spiritual light. If we do, then the grumpiness and reluctance will naturally dissipate.

This is quite different than just "loving our work." Some of us may have jobs that really get us energized. We love our work. Nothing wrong with that. But that's not what we're talking about here. Indeed, it's more likely that the bulk of us may not have fallen in love with our daily labor. Some may even dislike or hate what they do.

Whatever the worldly relationship we have with our work, we can build a solid spiritual foundation for it. And in doing so we in some way elevate all we do during our working hours. It becomes a form of prayer. It is an offering  to God. Even if we're not consciously doing so, He accepts our offering.

With this in mind, we turn to these final thoughts about work from Fulton Sheen (emphasis added): 

'...A medieval economist, Antonio of Florence, summed up the relationship of work to life in the happy formula: "The object of making money is that we may provide for ourselves and our dependents. The object of providing for self and other is that one may live virtuously. The object of living virtuously is to save our souls and attain eternal happiness."

Work should, in justice, receive two kinds of reward - for it is not only individual but also social. John Jones, who works in a mine, in tired at the end of the day: this is his individual sacrifice. For it he receives his wages. But John Jones has also, during the day, made a social contribution to the economic well-being of the country and the world. For this social contribution, John Jones today is given nothing...although he has a moral right to a shared of the social wealth his work creates. We need a modification of the wage system, so that the worker may share in the profits, ownership or management of his industry. When labor leaders and capitalists thus agree together to give labor some capital to defend, there will no longer be two rival groups in industry; labor and management will become two cooperating members working together, as the two legs of a man cooperate to help him walk." 

Note first the relationship of work to life - that happy formula of the medieval accountant. Brilliant.

Then note Bishop Sheen's recommendation of a modification of the wage system Again, brilliant.

The happy formula is within the grasp of all of us. It's clear and we can understand it. With that, the next step is to follow the steps Antonio outlines. Seriously.

Bishop Sheen's suggestion is a universal one. There are companies that do offer a stake - in the form of stock - to employees. It's one way to share capital. But Bishop Sheen's recommendation is a fundamental change that does not exist today. We would be wise to follow his advice. It would be both a more just and happier world if that were to happen.

Until it does, we need to take care of our own business. We need to do our best to find work that serves as much of the above as possible. If we can't, we can at least try and try again.

It would be worth the effort. 

In the meantime, our pursuit of sanctifying our work will at least turn all our work into a prayer. It will help us grow closer to God, no matter how we are paid. And that, in the end, is all that matters.