CLN Submission for National Pastoral on the Laity

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The USCCB Secretariat of Laity, Marriage, Family Life, and Youth coordinated a consultation for a new national pastoral document on the laity. The Catholic Labor Network hosted three synodal listening sessions in October, 2025. This is a summary of what CLN submitted to the USCCB.

Across all consultations, participants discerned a common movement of the Spirit: a renewed awareness of the laity’s baptismal vocation and a deep desire to align the Church’s teaching, witness, and structures with the Gospel’s call to justice and love.

Their conversations revealed both realism and hope — realism about the challenges of polarization, institutional inertia, and inconsistency; hope in the courage and creativity of lay disciples who are already transforming the Church from within.

There were 5 main takeaways across the many conversations:

  1. Living Baptism through Work and Witness

    The most active theme across sessions was the integration of faith and work. Participants described baptism as a lifelong call to live as priest, prophet, and king: sanctifying daily labor, speaking prophetically against injustice, and exercising leadership through service. They see their professional and community work as sacred — not separate from Church life, but its extension into the world.

    Many called the dignity of work a life issue, linking their ministry with the defense of human dignity and the common good. They emphasized that Catholic Social Teaching is not an optional add-on but the living expression of the Gospel in public life.

  2. Co-Responsibility and Synodality

    A strong current of reflection focused on co-responsibility. Participants understand their role not as passive recipients of pastoral care but as partners in the Church’s mission. They long for a culture of shared discernment and collaboration between clergy and laity, rooted in synodality and mutual respect.

    They also voiced that co-responsibility must be invited and modeled from leadership. When clergy and bishops honor lay expertise, the Church becomes more credible and united in its witness to the world.

  3. The Holy Spirit’s Work of Renewal

    Participants saw the Holy Spirit actively renewing the Church through grassroots movements, lay networks, and ministries that unite faith with justice. The Spirit is at work wherever Catholics listen to one another, empower the marginalized, and act with courage and humility.

    They testified to seeing the Spirit in intercultural parish communities, in collective discernment, and in the perseverance of believers who continue to labor for justice despite discouragement. “Things move quickly when the Holy Spirit is at work,” one noted — capturing the sense of momentum that accompanied the discussions.

  4. Hopes and Concerns for the Future

    Participants expressed both gratitude and concern. Their hopes include the rise of new lay leadership, expansion of grassroots chapters, and greater preaching and education on Catholic Social Teaching. Their concerns focus on the Church’s credibility when Catholic employers fail to honor workers’ rights, and on the gap between social teaching and institutional practice.

    They believe renewal will come from conversion — a willingness of the Church to listen, learn, and act alongside the laity in building just relationships, both within and beyond its walls.

  5. The Joy that Sustains the Mission

    Despite honest frustration, the tone of the listening sessions was joyful and forward-looking. Participants spoke of “joy that is not toxic positivity,” grounded instead in trust that God is at work through ordinary people.

    They see joy as both fuel and fruit of mission — the quiet confidence that the Gospel can still change hearts, workplaces, and systems.This joy expressed itself in laughter, solidarity, and gratitude for belonging to a Church that, though imperfect, continues to call and send.

The overarching takeaway is clear: the Holy Spirit is animating a renewal of the Church through the witness of the laity. Participants affirmed that the future of Catholic life will depend on deepening co-responsibility, recovering the dignity of work, and embodying Catholic Social Teaching in every level of Church life.

They envision a Church that listens before it lectures, collaborates rather than controls, and lives its teachings from the ground up. In their words and actions, lay Catholics are revealing that renewal is not a program — it is already happening wherever faith, justice, and joy meet.

Pilgrimage to Rome with CLN and the Labor Leaders from Chicago

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This week, Labor Leaders from Chicago, plus a few others from around the country, will journey to Rome as Pilgrims. 2025 is a Jubilee Year and the theme chosen by Pope Francis was “Pilgrims of Hope.” At a time when working people in the United States are under attack like never before from their own government: with hundreds of thousands of Federal Employees having Collective Bargaining Rights stripped away, even more laid off, the agencies designed to protect workers like the NLRB defunded and powerless, and a federal budget that strips millions of the poor from having health care, this is the time that we need hope, fraternity and humility.

We know that no matter the time that we are in, no matter the power of those that are attacking workers, we are not alone. We will never be alone. Christ lived as we lived, in the home of a worker. Our Church teaches us to stand In solidarity with workers, immigrants and the poor.

While in Rome, union leaders from the Chicago Federation of Labor, UNITE HERE, Service Employees International Union, Teamsters, International Association of Machinists, Laborers Union, and the Catholic Labor Network will have a true pilgrimage together: attending a Mass everyday, touring holy sites throughout Rome, passing through 3 of the Holy Doors, meeting with the Dicastery for Integral Human Development to discuss The Future of Work – Labor after Laudato Si, Artificial Intelligence and Migration, meeting with Italian Unions about Faith and Organizing, and the high point – a private Audience with Pope Leo XIV at the Vatican.

It’s my hope that these shared experiences over the next six days will lead all us who are attending to be able to find hope in these difficult moments, give us the encouragement to continue working for justice and provide us with moments of grace where we can renew our individual faith, trust in Jesus and give us the encouragement to share the Gospel and the teachings of the Church with the world.

We are all sinners beloved by God, and without the humility to ask for his help we are all on our own. As Pope Francis liked to say, “Pray for me.” But pray for all of us on this pilgrimage together. Pray that we all are able to renew the struggle for the Dignity of Workers in this World together.

 

Please follow along for more pictures and reflections from those on pilgrimage on our Facebook and Instagram pages!

 

CLN deplores LMU Administration’s Union-Busting, Supports Workers’ Strike

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The Catholic Labor Network was deeply disappointed to learn that the Loyola Marymount University announced it was ending bargaining with the union chosen by its non-tenure track faculty. Catholic Social Teaching is clear: all workers, including and especially those employed by Catholic institutions, have the right to organize unions for
collective bargaining. The University should immediately reverse its decision and resume bargaining with the union.

The board of the Catholic Labor Network has dispatched a letter to Chairman Paul Viviano of the LMU Board of Trustees explaining why the university’s decision is irreconcilable with Catholic Social Doctrine. We have also addressed a letter to Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles, asking him to intervene on behalf of the workers.

We understand that the nontenured faculty are making preparations to strike LMU to secure their rights. We hope that this does not prove to be necessary, that the university will choose to return to modeling Catholic teaching in its relations with its employees. If the workers must strike in order to obtain their rights, we will feel obligated to support their just demands.

Letter to LMU President and Board of Trustees

Letter to Archbishop Gomez

Lawrence Cafeteria Workers Win ServSafe Stipend After Months-long Fight!

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Courtesy of CLN Member Jeremy DaCruz

In February 2023, the Lawrence Cafeteria Workers (SEIU Local 3) went public with their demand that the School District extend a stipend which Lunch Aides at the smaller City of Lawrence Public Schools negotiated to Cafeteria Workers. This stipend was paid out for maintaining ServSafe Certification while working for the School District. Given that the Cafeteria Workers and the Lunch Aids do essentially the same work and must maintain the same certification, the Cafeteria Workers argued that fairness demanded that they be paid the same stipend.

To that end, SEIU Local 3 members circulated a petition, hand delivered it to the School District, staged a press conference in front of the School District, and called on community allies to demand that the Cafeteria Workers be paid the same stipend.

Finally, on June 23, 2023, the School District will pay the Lawrence Cafeteria Workers a one-time stipend of $5,500 for maintaining their ServSafe certification for School Year 2022-2023. This stipend will help the Cafeteria Workers get through the summer months when the Lawrence Public Schools are partially closed. While this is not the recurring stipend that SEIU Local 3 fought for, it is meaningful concession that the Cafeteria Workers secured after a months-long fight!

Free e-book collects Bishops’ Labor Day Statements

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A Guest Contribution from CLN Member Greg Guthrie

This e-book, Union Communion – Labor Unions and the Catholic Church, presents the Bishops’ authoritative annual Labor Day statements supporting labor unions. These statements are framed by commentary by America’s current preeminent  Labor Priests, “America’s most prominent labor leader,” and the Catholic Labor Network. The book intends 1) to educate anyone about the Catholic Church’s official stance on Labor Unions; 2) to remind all Catholic Church members of this official stance; and 3) to edify those who seek to deny, misrepresent or obscure this official stance.

CLICK TO READ

Report from the “Moral March on Washington”

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Poor People’s Campaign Brings out Faith, Labor Activists for Economic Justice

Have you heard of the Poor People’s Campaign? Back in 1968, Martin Luther King had a vision of poor people organizing across racial lines to transform American society. Fifty years later, that vision was picked up by leaders such as Rev. William Barber of North Carolina, who aspire to mobilize 140 million poor people and low-income workers around an agenda anchored in economic justice. As part of the campaign, on Saturday June 20 thousands rallied near the U.S. Capital to call for a “third reconstruction.” Labor and faith organizations were strongly represented in the effort.

Most of the speakers at the six-hour rally were grassroots leaders and activists, low-income workers and poor people testifying to their personal stories. These ranged from residents of Louisiana’s “cancer alley,” where industrial emissions of toxic waste threaten public health, to workers employed at Kentucky Fried Chicken and Starbucks who were fighting for a union and a living wage.

Among unions, the SEIU had a high profile, with busloads of members traveling from New York, Ohio and Florida to participate in the rally. “We’re here for the workers, for us – for a living wage,” explained SEIU 199 member Tommy Smith (pictured). “We aren’t getting what we deserve. The fat cats are.” Members of the IAM, UNITE HERE, and other unions were also in evidence.

Several Catholic organizations began the day with a short prayer service organized by the Franciscan Action Network in front of St. Patrick’s Church in downtown DC. These included Pax Christi and a large delegation of sisters from the Loretto community, among others. After the prayer service, the groups walked out in formation to join the March.

Other Catholic activists were already at the rally site, including Fr. Ty Hullinger of the Maryland Catholic Labor Network, who took a bus with the United Workers Association of Baltimore. “It is important for us as Catholics to show up and be part of these movements,” Hullinger explained.

In addition to grassroots activists, the rally also heard from a few labor leaders, including SEIU President Mary Kay Henry and AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Fred Redmond. “Poverty is a failure of the system, not poor people,” Redmond observed.

Fr. Clete Kiley offers invocation at AFL-CIO Convention

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The AFL-CIO held its convention last week in Philadelphia, and the Catholic Labor Network’s own Fr. Clete Kiley was chosen to give the invocation! “After two years of covid and so many setbacks, we declare that our work has inherent value, and every worker has inherent dignity given by You the Spirit of God, the Lord and the Giver of Life, and can never come from a corner office in a corporate building,” said Fr. Clete, who works for the hotel and food service union UNITE HERE. “May solidarity be our unbreakable bond. May it be our sure and certain way forward.  In this meeting, in our solidarity, may we raise up our movement to meet the moment. May we repeat it again and again and again: Solidarity Today, Solidarity Tomorrow, Solidarity Forever. Amen!”

To view his invocation in its entirety, CLICK HERE and advance the video to 18:30.

Labor Day Part II

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The Working Catholic: Labor Day Part II
By Bill Droel

Covid-19 brings us an opportunity to experiment with different work arrangements, including shorter hours. For example, the 100 employees at Kickstarter (www.kickstarter.com), a popular crowd-funding platform, will work four days per week in 2022, a minimum of 32 hours. Their pay remains the same as when the company required 40 hours. Aziz Hasan, Kickstarter CEO, says this is not a gimmick. “It’s really about…a more potent impact… [And] it opens up so much more range for us personally.”
Autonomy (https://autonomy.work), a research firm in the United Kingdom, has completed its participation in a five-year study of over 2,500 employees in Iceland. Backed by unions and civic groups, the workweek was four days with 36-hours per worker. Productivity remained the same. Sick days decreased. Customers noted better quality of service. Now, 86% of Iceland employees are allowed a four-day week. Another Autonomy study is under way in Scotland. For more on this get Autonomy’s Overtime: Why We Need a Shorter Working Week by Kyle Lewis (Verso, 2021).
The motivation for a shorter workweek on the part of executives is the realization that attracting and retaining competent employees, particularly because of Covid-19, is an expensive challenge. Some companies adopted employment flexibility long before Covid-19. For example, since the 1990s, Metro Plastic Technologies (www.metroplastics.com) has used six-hour days with 30-hours per week at comparable pay as a recruitment tool. The company has few worker shortages, according to Wall St. Journal (7/31/21).
Here are some considerations about a shorter workweek.
There will be complaints from a supplier or customer or worker or investor. A manager has to stand secure, resisting a premature return to old ways.
Flex-time and shorter workweek experiments can fail when they are implemented top-down, neglecting a genuine buy-in from employees from the start. Experiments originating with employees likely turn out better.
Workaholics are a further challenge. Some employees think clocking 50+ hours per week is noble in itself. A workaholic culture has infected many firms.
Keep in mind that the purpose of a shorter workweek is betrayed if time off is spent on unnecessary consumption. Waiting for the Weekend by Witold Rybcznski (Penguin Press, 1991) is a fascinating examination of how people carry their working day mentality into their time off by, for example, working on their putting. Josef Pieper (1904-1997) says this mentality exists because our culture is one of “total labor.” The true purpose of time off is to establish “the right and claims of leisure in the face of the claims of total labor,” he writes in Leisure: the Basis of Culture (Ignatius Press, 1952). The obstacle is an economy premised on total work. It needs “the illusion of a life fulfilled” so instead of genuine time off, it puts forth false leisure with “cultural tricks and traps and jokes.”
True leisure, Pieper concludes, is festivity or celebration. It is the point at which “effortlessness, calm and relaxation” come together. And true leisure “ultimately derives its life from divine worship,” even though people may not be conscious of the association.
“Have leisure and know that I am God.” –Psalm 46:11
Droel is with National Center for the Laity (PO Box 291102, Chicago, IL 60629)

Bishop McElroy, California Catholic Conference Stand with Farmworkers

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A California grower has filed a lawsuit striking at the heart of farmworker union organizing – one that could have catastrophic effects for workers trying to form unions in other sectors. Bishop Robert McElroy of the Diocese of San Diego, and the California Catholic Conference, are standing up to say no. The case will likely come before the Supreme Court any day now.

Cedar Point Nursery argues that when union organizers visit with workers on company property during NON-WORK TIME the union is “taking” the owners’ property in the meaning of the Constitution. Since many farmworkers live in company-provided housing, such a decision would make organizing farmworkers virtually impossible.

Bishop McElroy, quoted in the National Catholic Reporter, responded:

“This would be another step in constricting the ability of workers to form associations, to unionize and to effectively bargain. Those rights are being chipped away little by little, and that’s very destructive to our society.”

The California Catholic Conference has joined with California Rural Legal Assistance and Farmworker Justice to file an amicus brief with the court vindicating the workers’ cause.

Healthcare unions demand OSHA infectious disease standard

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Despite what you might hear from business lobbyists about alleged “overregulation,” insiders understand that OSHA seldom issues a regulation unless pushed by worker advocates. Although there are thousands of toxic chemicals in use in industry, regulations only cover a few dozen – usually in response to lobbying or lawsuits by labor unions and public health organizations. Nurses and health care workers have been waiting more than a decade for a workplace safety standard governing infectious diseases, and the pandemic has been the last straw: three unions have filed suit demanding that OSHA lay out what employers must do to protect health care workers.

OSHA began exploring an infectious disease standard in 2009, responding to a petition by health care worker unions during the swine flu epidemic. The 2014 Ebola scare strengthened the case for action, but after President Trump’s 2016 election OSHA dropped the subject. Now, after dozens of hospital and nursing home employees have died from COVID-19 while caring for the ill, workers are no longer willing to wait.

AFSCME (the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees), AFT (American Federation of Teachers), and the WSNA (Washington State Nurses Association) – each of which represent substantial numbers of health care workers – filed suit. The suit demands that OSHA prepare and issue an occupational safety and health standard protecting workers exposed to infectious diseases in the workplace.

Please pray for the safety of our health care workers, and rapid action by OSHA to keep them safe.