NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS | September 18 , 2015 | PAGE 5
A pope for the common people
Walmart to reopen store
that started strike wave
Solidarity will undergo a revival
Sept. 22-27 when Pope Francis
makes his first-ever visit to the
United States. Economic justice
will be a major part of his mes-
sage. In Washington, D.C., he’ll
be the first pope to address a
joint session of the United States
Congress, and immediately af-
ter, he’ll lunch with homeless,
mentally ill, and immigrant
clients of Catholic Charities. In
New York, he’ll speak to the
United Nations General Assem-
bly, and visit immigrant day la-
borers and Harlem schoolchild-
ren. And in Philadelphia, he’ll
visit a prison, celebrate a public
mass, and deliver a speech at the
World Meeting of Families.
Since Pope Leo XIII’s 1891
encyclical On Capital and Labor,
popes have criticized capitalist
exploitation and consumerism.
But Francis, more than other re-
cent popes, has kept a focus on
economic morality.
“He’s very critical of an un-
bridled capitalist system, a to-
tally uncontrolled free market,
because the results are inequity,”
says Father Chuck Lienert, Pas-
Walmart says it will soon re-
open the five stores it closed
simultaneously on April 13
for what it claimed were
plumbing repairs that would
take months to solve. In
charges filed with the Na-
tional Labor Relations Board,
United Food and Commercial
Workers and the union-
backed group Our Walmart
argue that the closures in
Florida, Oklahoma, and Texas
were simply cover for the real
target — the store in Pico
Rivera, California, where in
2012 workers waged the first
strike against Walmart. The
closures affected 2,200 work-
ers nationwide, including 530
at the Pico Rivera store. On
Sept. 10, the union filed new
charges, saying Wal-Mart had
no plans to offer jobs to for-
mer employees who were ac-
tively involved in the cam-
paign for higher wages.
During the closure, the union
says, pro-union workers were
told there were no positions
available to transfer to at
other stores.
what we need,” said AFL-CIO
President Richard Trumka at a
day-long meeting with Catholic
bishops in June. “Part of the
greatness of Pope Francis is that
he sees everyone. And in seeing
those who are excluded and suf-
fering, he lifts all of us up so we
can see and hear each other.”
PORTLAND EVENTS
tor Emeritus at Portland’s St.
Andrew Catholic Church, and a
member of the Faith Labor
Committee of Portland Jobs
with Justice. “He’s really talking
about what it means to be a
Christian in a broad sense, and
part of that is issues of social jus-
tice.”
Lienert points to two docu-
ments in particular that outline
the Pope’s views: In Evangelii
Gaudium, he takes aim at
trickle-down free-market ideol-
ogy and the economy of exclu-
sion and inequality; and in
Laudato Si, he talks of the moral
responsibility to deal with cli-
mate change, pollution, and
waste and the evils of a throw-
away culture.
“For the labor movement,
Pope Francis’s lessons of soli-
darity and inclusion are exactly
Watch the Pope’s address to Congress
St. Andrew Catholic Church will hold a
breakfast – open to all members of the
public – at which attendees can watch
Pope Francis address to Congress live.
That’s at 806 NE Alberta Ave., in the gym,
Thursday, Sept. 24. Doors open at 5 a.m.
The event starts at 6:30 and the address
begins at 7 a.m. PST.
Response to the Address The Faith
Labor Committee of Portland Jobs with
Justice is sponsoring an Interfaith
Blessing of Workers in response to the
Pope’s address to U.S. Congress. The
hour-long event will include statements
from clergy as well, and brief
presentations about several local worker
justice campaigns. That’s at noon,
Thursday, Sept. 24, at the First Christian
Church of Portland, 1314 SW Park Ave.
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