Study guide
Vocation: A rocky road E
mployment hasn’t recovered from the 2008 economic crash. Many people are still looking for work, and many who have found work had to take jobs that pay
much less than the ones they lost. As communities of Chris- tians, we can help our unemployed brothers and sisters find jobs, train for new ones and envision a world with sufficient, sustainable livelihood for all.
Exercise 1: Unemployment woes • Can you share your experience of being unemployed? • What emotions and thoughts do you have when you are without work? • How did you cope/are you coping? • What was/is the worst part? • How could/can the church help? • How is the employment situation in your community? • How are people in your congregation faring? How are the rest of you helping?
Exercise 2: Let’s help Go through the article (page 16) and list the specific ways Lutherans are helping their unemployed brothers and sis- ters. Which would work at your congregation? Now brainstorm five more ways your congregation could
help. Pick the most feasible of the ideas, develop an “action plan” for implementing it for your congregation, and then give it to your pastor or congregational council.
Exercise 3: ‘Do justice’ Scripture challenges God’s people to put their faith into action for our broken world. Read Micah 6:1-8 and discuss: • According to Micah, what are the marks of a righteous life? • What does “justice” mean as it pertains to everyday life? • What injustices exist in our nation’s economic system? • How can we “do justice” where our unemployed neighbors are concerned?
Exercise 4: Labor pains Wall Street has rebounded from the 2008 crash, business profits are high, and income for the top 20 percent has
By Robert C. Blezard
increased dramatically. Yet unemployment is high and most of the jobs created in this recovery have been on the lower end of the pay scale. • What fundamental economic shifts have taken place? • Will employment and income ever get back to pre-2008 levels?
Exercise 5: Work rewards • Does a convenience-store clerk, farmhand or a coffeeshop barista work less hard than a stockbroker, computer pro- grammer or a member of Congress? • What explains the difference in their pay? • Should everyone who works 40 hours a week be able to afford rent, food, clothing and health care? • Why is a living wage such a divisive issue in our nation? • What would a living wage be in your community? • The federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour, which is equal to about $15,000 a year. How far is that from a living wage in your community? • Should the minimum wage, at $7.25 since July 2009, be increased?
Exercise 6: Livelihood for all The ELCA’s 1999 social statement “Sufficient, Sustain- able Livelihood for All” (
www.elca.org/socialstatements) explores how our beliefs and faith practices interact with the market economy. At one point it states: “As a church we confess that we are in bondage to sin and submit too read- ily to the idols and injustices of economic life. We often rely on wealth and material goods more than God and close ourselves off from the needs of others. Too uncritically we accept assumptions, policies, and practices that do not serve the good of all.” One at a time, discuss each of those provocative state-
ments. Do you agree, disagree and why. (The whole statement is worthy of in- depth study.)
This study guide is offered as one example of the more than 390 that are currently available on The Lutheran’s website. Download guides (includ- ing a longer version of this one)—free to print and Web subscribers—at
www.thelutheran.org (click “study guides”).
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www.thelutheran.org
Author bio: Blezard is an assistant to the bishop of the Lower Susquehanna Synod. He has a master of divinity degree from Boston Uni-
versity and did subsequent study at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg (Pa.) and the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia.
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