It has been such a long time since I chatted with you all… I’ve become so used to writing, rain or shine, vacation or work trip, that it was strange to go for more than a weekend without posting on the blog. You missed a lot of softball news while I was gone—a forfeit by Westport Road Baptist Church’s softball team Tuesday (now 0-3) and my sister’s team heading to the district tournament today. Rachel got an honorable mention in the all-league team voting, too.

You also missed an awesome conference. I spent the beginning of this week at the Interfaith Worker Justice conference in Chicago with NNPCW alumna Ann Crews Melton. I’ve mentioned IWJ on the blog before, and have also said that we will work with them at the Leadership Event this summer. Ann and I went partly because the Office of Urban Ministry was paying our way, and also because we saw a few workshops we wanted to attend.

The trip was well worth it. This conference was perhaps the most useful religious-affiliated conference I’ve ever been to. I attended workshops on religious women as activists, fundraising, and grantwriting. Ann learned how to start a 501(c)3 non-profit. We learned real skills that we can use in our work, and got to meet great people in the process.

I also attended my first “protest,” if you will. Those of you who know me know that even when I don’t agree with authorities, anything that could even be construed as rebellious makes me slightly nervous. So I must say that the butterflies did come up when we headed off in the buses to La Casa Del Pueblo, a grocery store in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago, to rally for the grocery workers’ right to organize. It was actually kind of fun, though—we chanted “No justice, no peace,” sang gospel spirituals, prayed for the workers and the owners of the grocery store, and heard speeches. And no, we did not chain ourselves to pipes or get arrested. We were a very tame crowd, really—not at all like what I’d imagined when I thought of such things.

The conference, with its emphasis on partnerships between religious groups and the labor movement, actually put me in touch with my roots a bit. My own father, before he died, was a union member, as was my mom until recently. So I don’t visualize some troublemaking, leftist radical or mob boss when I hear the words “union” and “labor.” Rather, I think of my rather mild-mannered father, who had a decent union job in an aluminum plant for 20 years.

Learning about struggles other workers in this country face, such as those at La Casa Del Pueblo grocery store, reminded me how much I owe to that union job. For my family, the union truly did give us a better life—a life with enough for food and clothes, a life with healthcare, a life with retirement and pension plans. My grandparents grew up among the rural poor, and I have a college education. The difference lies in two things: their hard work, and the opportunities provided by union jobs that launched my family into the middle class. Spending the weekend talking about human dignity for workers, and our responsibility as people of faith to advocate for that, helped me to understand this in a more real and vital way.

“Thus says the Lord of hosts: Render true judgments, show kindness and mercy to one another; do not oppress the widow, the orphan, the alien, or the poor; and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another.” --Zechariah 7:9-10

Kelsey

ahhhh, how sad that your game was forfeited after all! i hope it wasn't because you were late. perhaps that stuffed crust pizza was well worth it, ya think? best i ever had.

-kurt-
"happy host and servant"