CARDIJN LIVES
“Each and every young worker is worth more than all the gold in the world,” Fr. Josef Cardijn’s powerfully poetic cry rings through the 40 years of the Y.C.W.’s Australian history.
This phrase appeals to the young worker’s instinctive certainty of his or her infinite and inalienable dignity.
This dignity, Cardijn explained, arises first from man’s creation by God in his own image.
Second, this dignity derives from the God-given purpose of each person’s life; a mission to develop one’s capacities to the limit; to become “more fully human” through service to the community.
Jesus
Thirdly, dignity that leads finally to unity with Christ, a dignity to be united with Christ as man in human solidarity with all people and with Christ as God in life after death.
Yet when we, the Australian YCW look at our society we see a reality which contradicts Cardijn’s vision of the dignity of people.
And a reality that challenges and sometimes shatters that certainty in the hearts of young people of their own worth.
For the unemployed particularly, feelings of rejection and depression dim their appreciation of their status as sons and daughters of God.
Many young workers experience unskilled jobs, both blue and white collar, in which boredom wears away at their creative urge.
Meaning
In these occupations they fail to find the sense of contributing to the common good that adds purpose and meaning to their lives.
The profit motive which rules, divides rather than unites people.
And materialism and consumer pressures obscure the young workers’ freedom to contemplate the spiritual dimension of unity with Christ.
In a 28th National Council the Australian Young Christian Workers considered its response to this reality.
We saw that our task is to inspire young workers with an appreciation of their dignity and to work to change factors in society that fail to respect this. We planned for a number of action based enquiries on many different aspects of the lives of young working people e.g. work, politics, family, money, leisure, the media.
The action that is generated by these enquiries will enable Y.C.W. members and young workers to discover their own role in bringing, achieving and building a society founded on Christian values.
Stefan Gigacz
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