When we serve others, when we create, when we work to contribute to the world around us, we as human beings become more fully alive. Work holds a sense of purpose and dignity that feeds the human soul. That, ultimately, is the purpose of work—to build up, not to reduce human beings to mere producers or commodities.  

The Catholic Church continues to show up to advocate for the rights of workers, most visibly in the 20th century tradition by helping unions to come together, organize, and obtain just wages, benefits, and safe working conditions — all benefits that would allow workers to adequately support their families and be contributors to the community.   

Catholic Sisters continue to show up as part of this faithful solidarity, and with the formation of NETWORK over 50 years ago, Sisters took the work to the next level by directly lobbying for pro-labor federal policies, a practice that continues to this day.  

Sadly, in the decades since then, workers have suffered from the methodical and malicious dismantling of labor unions and ruthless attacks on organized labor. There continues to be a coordinated effort to curtail workers’ rights and put profits over people. Wages have stagnated since the 1970s.   

In many ways, the weakening of unions was an early warning sign of the destruction of government we see today. The second Trump administration is on a mission to destroy any function of government that contributes to human dignity: foreign aid, health care, due process, and yes, workers’ rights.  

Andres Chavez, Bus Riders, and NETWORK staff pray at the grave of labor leader and civil rights activist Cesar Chavez in Keene, California on an Oct. 16 stop of the Nuns on the Bus & Friends 2024 “Vote Our Future” tour. Photo: Jacob Schatz, CCR Studios

Those who advocate for the dignity of work in the Catholic Social Justice tradition harken back to Pope Leo XIII, as he addressed the radical changes to the world brought by the Industrial Revolution, condemning unjust wages, unsafe working conditions, unbridled capitalism, and anything that risked reducing workers to less than their full dignified humanity. The document in which he addressed these issues—and championed the right of workers to organize—was called Rerum Novarum, Latin for “New Things.”  

Now in the 21st century, another pope, this one aptly named Leo XIV, has taken up the thread and is applying his predecessor’s moral lens to the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI). In this space too, Sisters are showing up to help lead the way. NETWORK’s engagement with AI policy is truly a “new thing” in the church’s support for labor rights. We recognize the risks: cogs and boilers have been replaced by artificial neural networks, data centers, and algorithms. More than 130 years since the warning of Pope Leo XIII, technological innovation again threatens to make humans grist for the machines.  

The emergence of AI is yet another reason why it is urgent that workers organize.   

We cannot shy from these challenges. Rather we must lean into hope. We must hope as the generations before us did with the hope of dignified workers’ rights so that all who toil might be able to share in the richness that God intends for all of us. We must join in solidarity with many unorganized and organized workers today who are beginning to realize their power to come together and bravely demand what is rightfully theirs.

# # #