“It’s not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me.” thus replied Batman when Rachel asked him his name.
Today is labor day, a celebration of the dignity of human labor. For many years, labor has often been defined in terms of manual and physical labor. In recent years, labor has also come to include intellectual labor and knowledge work. In both cases, man is defined by the work that he does and he finds fulfillment in the fruits of his labor. Nothing can be more punishing than doing work one does not enjoy or love doing. And nothing can be more dehumanizing that not finding work to do or being denied the right to work.
Man’s natural state is not rest nor sleep. These are but necessary interludes to prepare us for the next day’s work. Man’s natural state is to be productive, to make things out of the resources available to him, both his own talents and the materials found in nature. Thus, by the sweat of his brow, man eats his food and lives. Labor is often defined in terms of the money that is paid for it. But not all labor can be defined in terms of money. Some meaningful labor is not and cannot be measured in terms of money, like raising a family, or rearing children, or making a household, or just being there when others need one’s presence. Milton, on his blindness, wrote: “They also serve who only stand and wait.”
While labor cannot always be measured in money terms, it can always be seen in the fruits that it bears. The fruits of labor depend on the spirit that inspires it. If labor is inspired by the Spirit, then its fruits are love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. If driven by the flesh, the fruits of labor are adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,envyings, murders, drunkenness, revelings. Thus, St. Paul tells us through his letter to the Galatians.
I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.
John 15:1-8