Well, it’s not exactly a direct historical line, but there is a logical and philosophical connection between the reformed understanding of vocation and observance of Labor Day. (I have to disclose that I was a big fan of the British TV series Connections hosted by James Burke who traced components of modern life back to people and events and discoveries in the past.)
Up until the Reformation teed up by Martin Luther, the Roman Church divided vocation into two main categories: church vocations and everything else. The priesthood, the diaconate, and orders like monks and nuns were the vocations to which one was called to a special life of set-apart holiness. One was “called” into church vocations. All secular occupations were of a lesser sort, not really true vocations even, just occupations. So other than holy orders, everyone else was just plain folks, even nobility. Luther, as part of his re-reading of the Bible declared that every occupation under heaven was holy and a calling from God. Famously he would say that if you were called to be a baker or a brewer, be the best baker or brewer you could be. Your job is one of the ways you live out your faith. He broadened “vocation” from church orders to the whole gamut of work. Mind you, Luther was a monk himself, so this was a big departure from contemporary theology. Just as the individual dealt with God directly for salvation (instead of going through the church structure only) in the rest of Reformed theology, each individual was called to his or her occupation as a vocation, a full-blown just-as-holy-as-a-priest-vocation. All work, when done to God’s glory, was sacred work. From the Roman Church’s perspective, this was awkward because elevating ordinary jobs to vocation status also diminished the superiority of church vocations. That our modern use of the word for “vocational education” to mean practical job training instead of going to seminary shows how thoroughly the Reformation reoriented our concept.
Over time, this set the stage for the further democratization of vocation and working in the modern, industrial age (maybe since the 18th century or so) that finally led to the European and U.S. labor movements and unions and workplace safety regulations and such. It is from that overall social change that the observance of a day celebrating the labor movement came to pass.
The other current in this topic goes back to the Hebrew concept of Sabbath, the God-given day of rest. That it is the first commandment shows God takes it very seriously. In fact, God wants people to take a day of rest because God rested in the first place. The idea of a week is pretty much invented by the first commandment, since before that and in parts of the world not organized on the Sabbath principle the rhythm of work was more based on seasons and lunar months, with episodic days of rest and celebration like a harvest festival or solstice holy day. A community would break and have a big party, then go back to working for months until the next festival. The Hebrew weekly cycle turns out to be pretty productive and wise, that more frequent breaks (every seven days) is good for us.
So, connect Martin Luther, the international labor movement, and the Ten Commandments, and that is why we get next Monday off.
But to be honest with you, you first need the holy Sabbath day of spiritual rest… so I remind you to worship the God who calls you into your vocation on Sunday!
In Christ,
David
Texts for Sunday
From the Hebrew Bible Exodus 3:1-15
From the Epistles Romans 12:9-21
From the Gospels Matthew 16:21-28
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