Commentary : Clergy on the Front Lines

As a community clergy person who has been involved in the USC workers’ struggle for a just contract, I have made it a point to hear both sides of this dispute. I have met with university administrators, leaders of Local 11 of the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union and workers.

I am well aware of--and have directly benefited from--USC’s community work. If I thought that its leaders were immovable or without conscience, my involvement would be a futile act of self-righteousness.

As a priest, however, I also know that good people sometimes do the wrong thing. Institutions are no different.

Job security is a concern for many people. Whereas just 25 years ago it was common for people to retire from jobs they held for a longtime, we now act as if that is as unrealistic as utopia. In this country, corporate interests dictate what is seen as realistic or of value. I think that is wrong. I don’t think that money should be the bottom line, even as I appreciate that this is the way of world.

I know that workers cannot expect unconditional job guarantees. That is not what they are asking for. Los Angeles City Council members have offered as a starting point the language of the city’s “Worker Retention Ordinance,” which would require a new contractor for the university to hire employees who worked for the contractor’s predecessor for at least 90 days, which especially for workers who have been with USC for 10, 20, or 20 years, seems only fair.

That is why I have fasted and prayed with these workers. That is why I have led worship services and visited with them. As a pastor, I have a calling to support the people in my parish.

By joining in these efforts, I am not negotiating a contract. I am standing with the most vulnerable members of my community. It is unjust for USC to ask them to run the greatest risk.

Good intentions are not how businesses negotiate, they sign contracts. Why should people who would lose the most--their homes, their benefits, a better life for their children--be the ones to live without protection?

After five years, it seems to me appropriate for frustrated parties to bring to bear whatever pressure is necessary to get the immovable giant to move. The university has decided that including even the most minimal job security language in the contract would be capitulation to

the union. It intends to win by waiting it out.

It can afford to wait it out; the workers can’t. As a community member, I intend to pressure the university to do the right thing. I know both sides. I know the workers are right.

As a Christian, I have a calling to stand on the side of justice, whether it seems realistic to the powerful of this world. As a priest, I have a calling to defend workers’ God-given right to dignity. I also know, from Scripture and history, that the truth does not always win. I do not have a calling to win. I have a calling to the “way of the cross.”