Archbishop Thomas G. Wenski of Miami cited the importance of work in supporting families in the U.S. bishops’ 2015 Labor Day statement, which drew on Pope Francis’ June encyclical on ecology, “Laudato Si’.” Archbishop Wenski said ,“We must not resign ourselves to a ‘new normal’ with an economy that does not provide stable work at a living wage for too many men and women.... We are in need of a profound conversion of heart at all levels of our lives.” The archbishop explained, “Wage stagnation has increased pressures on families, as the costs of food, housing, transportation, and education continue to pile up.” He added that “the violation of human dignity is evident in exploited workers, trafficked women and children, and a broken immigration system that fails people and families desperate for decent work and a better life.” Archbishop Wenski said that in “Laudato Si’” Pope Francis challenges people to see the connections between human labor, care for creation and honoring the dignity of the “universal family, a sublime communion which fills us with a sacred, affectionate and humble respect.”
Work and the Dignity of Families
Show Comments (0)
Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.
The latest from america
Perhaps a revealing question is whether the church will continue the radical novelty Francis brought as a pope from a religious order—and whether this is the continuity needed now.
'America' is covering its 10th papal conclave this week—and while the technology has changed, the content remains much the same.
No one gathers Christians—Catholics and non-Catholics alike—throughout the world, however imperfectly, in the way the pope does. The world needs the pope.
German Catholic bishops say that even where the party has not tipped into extremism, it has failed to reform itself of such tendencies. They charge that a nationalism incompatible with Christianity has become the AfD’s animating ideology.