Just Start (9): Offer Work Opportunities

In this 9th video in the series on the works of mercy, people from Uruguay, Italy and the Philippines talk about initiatives that seek to help provide opportunities for finding work, an essential element of human dignity.

Suggestions for action

— Pray for those without a steady job.

— When receiving news about job openings, consider whether this information could be passed out to relatives, friends or acquaintances out of work.

— Try to provide small service to people or families suffering from unemployment.

— While carrying out your job, try to find time to put your talents to the service of others.

— Offer God your work, asking him for specific intentions.

Quotes from Sacred Scripture to reflect on

— You yourselves know that these hands ministered to my necessities, and to those who were with me.In all things I have shown you that by so toiling one must help the weak, remembering the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive’ (Acts 20:34-35).

— And [Paul] went to see them; and because he was of the same trade he stayed with them, and they worked, for by trade they were tentmakers (Acts 18:2-3).

— But we beseech you, brethren, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work (1 Thess 5:12-13).

— Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life (Jn 6:27).

Quotes from Pope Francis to reflect on

— Work is more than earning one’s sustenance. Work gives us dignity. Whoever works has a special dignity, the dignity of a person (Homily, 1 May 2013).

— Commitment to work and the spiritual life, in the Christian conception, are not at all at odds with one another. It is important to understand this properly! Prayer and work can and must be in harmony (Audience, 19 August 2015).

— Work, in its many forms, is proper to the human person. It expresses the dignity of being created in the image of God. Thus, it is said that work is sacred (Audience, 19 August 2015).

— It makes me sad to see people without work, who don’t find work and don’t have the dignity of bringing bread home. And I rejoice greatly when I see governments go to great lengths to find jobs and try to see to it that everyone has work. Work is sacred, work gives dignity to a family. We have to pray that no family is left without work (Audience, 19 August 2015).

Quotes from Saint Josemaria to reflect on

— Work is one of the highest human values and the way in which men contribute to the progress of society. But even more, it is a way to holiness (Conversations, no. 24).

— Add a supernatural motive to your ordinary work and you will have sanctified it (The Way, 359).

— As you go about your work, doing your job in society, each of you can and should turn your occupation into a real service. Your work should be done well, mindful of others’ needs, taking advantage of all advances in technology and culture. Such work fulfils a very important function and is useful to the whole of humanity, if it is motivated by generosity, not selfishness, and directed to the welfare of all, not our own advantage, if it is filled with the Christian sense of life (Christ is Passing By, no. 166).

— Before God, no occupation is in itself great or small. Everything gains the value of the Love with which it is done (Furrow, 487).

15 articles on sanctifying work