Working for Respect
There is a practical imperative for New Orleans to become a roll your sleeves up type of town instead of a let your hair down type of vacation site. The Big Easy must transform itself into the Grind if the city is to recover at an encouraging rate. City and state officials certainly acknowledge the value of hard work in their rhetoric around the rebuilding of New Orleans. However, will they push employers to respect blue collar labor enough to give hotel, construction, and hospital workers the financial ability to send their children to Tulane, Xavier, or UNO? Louisiana Weekly 11/20/2006

Religious Leaders, Hospital Workers
Churches, synagogues and mosques throughout the state over the past few years have contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of food, clothing, heating oil and medicine to help out laid-off workers. Many of those items have been distributed in northern Maine by the Eastern Maine Labor Council, located off South Main Street on Ivers Street. Bangor Daily News 8/12/2006

Protesters Pray for Higher Guard Wages (.pdf)
sReligious leaders are turning to an ancient tactic in a bid to boost pay and benefits for downtown security guards-prayer. A diverse group of spiritual leaders from across the Boston area rallied in a bid to boost the wages and benefits for Boston security guards. The Boston Globe 8/4/2006

Labor Day Devotion: Faith Communities Focus on Workers
Many faith communities will use Labor Day to highlight employee struggles for fair pay, benefits and respect by participating in Labor In the Pulpits. The eight-year-old program promotes economic justice and strengthens labor-religious ties by having workers and union leaders speak to congregations about workplace challenges and campaigns. International Labor Communications Association 7-30-04

Sojourners Exclusive: Update on Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride
Riding a bus on the Miami route of the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride, Sister Barbara Pfarr came full circle. Before her current work with the Interfaith Worker Justice, she devoted 15 years to helping southern Florida farm workers. SojoNet 10-21-03

Saturday, The Rabbis Marched
Shabbat Shuvah, the Saturday between Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur, traditionally presents rabbis the opportunity to sermonize before a packed congregation about problems in the Jewish community. The Jewish Week 10-10-03

Service Honors Those who Died in '29
A service to remember the six workers killed in the bloody strike of 1929 took place in front of the Marion Manufacturing building Monday, 74 years after the tragic event. The McDowell News 9-30-03

Interfaith Worker
My name is Andy Schwiebert and I'm on the Advance Team for the two San Francisco Bay Area buses traveling across the country to Washington DC and New York on the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride. WireTap 9-29-03

Immigrant Workers Take Freedom Ride for Rights
They want decent pay, respect from employers, a shot at a good education. The American Dream, really. So earlier this month, hundreds of immigrants and their supporters boarded about 20 buses from nine cities to kick off a new national Freedom Ride. The Virginian-Pilot 9-29-03

Freedom Rides Set to Bring Awareness to Plight of Immigrant Workers
Suely Ngouy came to the United States as a refugee from war-ravaged Cambodia 20 years ago. Her family struggled to adjust to a new home, a new language and endure unfair labor conditions. AP News 9-22-03

Effort Memorializes Marion Strike
An advocate for immigrant workers said the labor struggles of today are similar to those faced by the textile workers at Marion Manufacturing Co. back in 1929. The McDowell News 9-22-03

Churches Reach Out to Workers
A movement to improve conditions for working people has been growing steadily in the United States for the past seven years. But it hasn't been happening on plant floors, office buildings or union halls. It's coming from the pulpits of a growing number of houses of worship. Pittsburgh Tribune-Review 9-01-03

Lifelong Mormon Sees No Conflict Between her Religion, Union Support
Michael Lester has heard every possible claim against unions -- that labor bosses extort money and incite violence against businesses, or that greedy workers are single-handedly crippling the economy. Just hyperbole, she says. The Salt Lake Tribune 8-31-03

Fowl Behavior
Tyson Foods is the biggest seller of chicken in the world. And in an industry that is known for severe labor violations, it could also be considered the worst. In These Times 3-19-01

Pious Peacemaker
Cardinal has long reputation for mediating labor disputes. Ventura County Star 10-15-00

Organize! Persistence Pays
Employees of Erickson Cosmetics Company (makers of Banana Boat lotion) only wanted what they had earned. Especially workers like Juana Vasquez who worked at the factory in the northside of Chicago until the day before she gave birth in February 1999. She had felt fortunate to have a steady job that provided healthcare, but soon after she gave birth to her son she discovered she no longer had either. Shelterforce 9/10-00

Points of Light Award
Kim Bobo tirelessly fights for justice for low-wage workers in America, particularly those who work in our nation’s poultry industry. Daily Point of Light Award Winner Profile 9-19-00

Labor, Religion Work to Deepen Old Ties
Unions are turning to churches, synagogues and mosques to help them organize workers. Beliefnet/RNS 8-23-00

Organizing in Faith
A labor union and an interfaith group have teamed up to train future religious leaders to help low-paid workers. Beliefnet/AP 8-11-00

Seminarians Seek Labor Justice
Churches punch in for workers’ rights: For a group of theological students from various faiths, their summer program is a far cry from the classroom and the detailed analysis of sacred texts. Instead, they are preparing for the ministry by working with labor unions in communities across the country to improve the conditions for low-wage workers. Christian Science Monitor 8-10-00

Putting Labor Back in the Pulpits
Since 1996, thousands of members of congregations around the country have listened to union leaders and activists speak about their experiences as both people of faith and union members during Labor in the Pulpits Labor Day weekend worship services. Salt of the Earth: Social Justice News 8-00

Religion and Labor’s Love Lost–and Found
In the early history of organized labor in the United States, many faith communities worked hand-in-hand with workers to help labor secure worker rights through the formation of unions. Salt of the Earth: Social Justice News 7-00

Labor and Religion: Working Together for Common Goals
All around the country, in the pulpit and on the picket line, labor unions and religious groups are joining forces to make the world more just for working men and women. AFSME Public Employee 3/4-00

Natural Born Allies
Labor activists and people of faith rally around “core values.” Sojourners 1/2-00

Buyer Be Aware
As the holiday shopping season approaches, many people of faith and good will are faced with a dilemma: How to purchase presents for loved ones without buying goods made in sweatshops or under other unjust conditions. Ace Weekly Magazine 12-99

More than Pickets and Prayers
Across the nation, people of faith are seeking ways to strengthen their congregations’ ministry with and for workers within and outside the congregation. Sojourners 5/6-99