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Reclaiming the Labor Movement

Religion, Labor, and Deep Solidarity

 
 

A Training Built from the Religion and Labor Series

In a time when working people all across the globe and specially in the U.S are under attack what, if anything, can religion do about it? Is religion just about utopias and pie-in-the-sky idealism or can it actually radicalize the labor movement as we know it and help to build economic and political power for all working people? We at the Wendland-Cook program believe that the labor movement is crucial to any democratic struggle for greater economic and political justice, and because religious democracy is as rare as economic democracy, deepening the relationship between religion and labor is key to the success of both. These are the core questions we’ll explore here and in the following modules.

The video to the left is the introduction. Below, you'll find the remaining three sessions in the training.

Start the Training!
 
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Reclaiming the Labor Movement

Below are the individual session videos

 
 

SESSION 1: Conditions & Context of the Labor Movement

There is a new labor movement emerging that recognizes the importance of deepening religious democracy as we fight for economic democracy. This new movement is intersectional to its core as it builds power for working people across race, gender, sexuality, and religion. In this session we’ll explore how this new labor movement can meet the new and complex challenges that face all working people today. Late modern capitalism has created new political and economic challenges that need to be confronted.

 
Watch the Religion and Labor Webinar Series Here!

Discussion Questions:

Want to use this video in your church or class as a discussion tool? Unsure about how to begin? Not to worry! Try these discussion questions out as ways to get the conversation going:

  1. What do you think of when you think of labor movement? Where do you see it today?

  2. Who are workers? Was Jesus a worker?

  3. If so, how does that impact the ways that we see and engage in the labor movement?

  4. What are the overlaps between the challenges that unions face and those that faith organizations/churches face? What are the possibilities for collaboration?

Further Resources:

 

SESSION 2: How can we build power to empower this new labor movement?

In this video, we explore a lesson that makes common sense to all of us: the stories we tell about ourselves and our struggles create the memory and meaning that energize a movement. But these stories need to be re-told in ways that reckon with the reality that this new labor movement can handle complexities of race, gender, and immigration. This new labor movement is for everyone and the stories we tell have to prove that.

 

Discussion Questions:

Want to use this video in your church or class as a discussion tool? Unsure about how to begin? Not to worry! Try these discussion questions out as ways to get the conversation going:

  1. What road have you chosen throughout your life? Why? How about your church?

  2. What kind of emphasis does your church place on deed versus on creed? What is the relationship between the two in your church? What do you want the relationship to be?

  3. How does/can your church use storytelling to envision alternative systems and ways of being in the world?

  4. What does it mean to bring soul into the movement? What examples can you think of of soul in movements? How can we be a part of that tradition?

Further Resources:

  • Read our Interventions forum on Cooperatives and Religious Communities, featuring contributions by Joerg Rieger; Gilda Haas; Jessica Gordon-Nembhard; Nathan Schneider; Aaron Stauffer. Read more here!

  • Check out a related Interventions piece by Dr. Joerg Rieger’s: “Fooling Americans is Becoming More Difficult: COVID-19, Black Lives Matter, and What Is and Isn’t Essential.” Available here.

 

SESSION 3: What can the new labor movement can do for you?

What can the labor movement do for you? Why is it important to improve the state of our current labor and organizing institutions? These questions often come in tow with a lack of appreciation for how much the labor movement has accomplished. But in reality, our very rhythm of life is based on many of the gains that were hard won by the labor movement.

 

Discussion Questions:

Want to use this video in your church or class as a discussion tool? Unsure about how to begin? Not to worry! Try these discussion questions out as ways to get the conversation going:

  1. What are the things that you benefit from today that were won by labor movements?

  2. How can we be talking about these things in our church communities? In public sphere? In work life and spiritual life?

  3. Consider this question from Charles Clark, National Community Engagement Coordinator at AFL-CIO: “How do we have conversations with labor leaders and church leaders to show the commonality between the two, and that there is a path forward for both of us together, building the kind of leverage of power that we need for working families?”

Further Resources:

Want More Exchanges?

Check out our other trainings in religion and labor; community organizing and the church; Bible and Economics, and more!

More Exchanges Trainings
 

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