Adam Russell Taylor

Since the pandemic upended life as we knew it over two years ago, I have found the apostle Paul’s letter to the church at Corinth particularly instructive. In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul provides one of the most poignant metaphors in all of scripture, comparing the health of the church to that of the human body — a comparison that also applies to the health of our broader communities, nation, and world.

ON MAY 1, tens of millions of people across the globe celebrate International Workers’ Day, often called May Day or International Labor Day. Countries around the world have made May Day a major holiday, but its origin as a day to fight for and honor the rights of workers has strong roots in the United States and the struggle for the eight-hour workday. During the Great Depression, Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin chose May Day 1933 to launch the first issue of The Catholic Worker, a newspaper dedicated to the proposition that it is “possible to be radical and not atheist”—an idea that has also been central to Sojourners these past 50 years. In fact, a radical commitment to labor rights and economic justice is because of our faith, not in spite of it.

The dedication and sacrifice of labor activists has led to hard-won rights—including the eight-hour workday, the weekend, safe working conditions, an end to most child labor, and more—rights far too many of us can take for granted. And yet standing up for the dignity and rights of workers remains incredibly important because these rights are not enjoyed by everyone equally and have been relentlessly eroded over the past four decades. The struggle for labor rights has shifted amid an evolution in the nature of work, with many workers exercising greater agency in the COVID-19 pandemic, leaving behind jobs that are often underpaid, unsafe, or underappreciated.

The State of the Union, the annual televised presidential report to Congress, can easily devolve into political theater. But at its best, the address provides the president a critical opportunity to galvanize the nation to overcome shared challenges. When President Joe Biden delivers his first official State of the Union on Tuesday, in addition to addressing the Russian invasion of Ukraine, I hope he seizes the moment by tapping into the values that animate his Catholic faith — including the values of solidarity and a “preferential option for the poor.” Solidarity, as understood through Catholic social teaching, is based on the understanding that we are one human family — our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers. We see this preferential option for the poor in Jesus’ dual call to care for the most vulnerable (Matthew 25) and combat injustice by being “good news to the poor” (Luke 4).

THE MIDTERM ELECTION season is already underway, with a great deal at stake. In the face of the rush of political ads, phone calls, debates, and more, I’m reminded of the Apostle Paul’s timeless words that the “fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Galatians 5:22-23). These fruits, or virtues, don’t easily translate into the messiness of politics, but they are desperately needed today. Sadly, our electoral system increasingly rewards and perpetuates antithetical “fruits”—such as contempt, vitriol, hate for the “other side,” and fear. The root causes include media echo chambers, gerrymandered districts, disinformation promulgated on social media, and partisan primaries—the negative aspects of which receive precious little attention. Until we change the perverted incentives that have become hardwired into our electoral system, our politics will remain stuck in a vicious cycle of acrimony and stalemate.

We can honor King’s vision by working to restore the voting rights that he knew were so central to dismantling racism in this country. As King proclaimed, “Voting is the foundation stone for political action.” 

While this prayer may sound overly sentimental in the face of great peril and challenge, love has the power to cast out fear and undergirds the very pursuit of justice and peace. Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.”

DURING ADVENT, I always love reading and reflecting on Mary’s Magnificat, which begins, “My soul magnifies the Lord.” This song is more well-known and treasured within the Catholic Church than in my own tradition; I didn’t fully learn to appreciate it until I started delving deeper into Catholic social teaching. It is easy to gloss over how radical and profound this song of praise is (“He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty”), both when Mary proclaimed these words as well as for us today. This song, which is only found in the gospel of Luke, comes just after Mary greets her cousin Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist and whose baby moves within her womb.

Mary’s song provides a timeless dose of pregnant hope during a year that has been characterized by so much peril, loss, and hardship. As we prepare to put 2021 behind us, it is important to take the time to properly lament the tragedy and heartache of this pastyear, including the hundreds of thousands of largely preventable deaths to COVID-19; the ways our democracy and the right to vote have come under increasing assault; the stark, often-devastating reminders of our mounting climate catastrophe; and so much more.

I remember the flood of emotions I felt almost a year ago when I heard that the major news networks were calling the 2020 election results: overwhelming relief and renewed hope. Far beyond a victory for then-to-become President Joe Biden, it felt like a victory for our democracy — and an imperative to resuscitate, revitalize, and reinvent that democracy.

Fast forward a year: I’m filled with a festering weariness and escalating heartache.

A TREE'S LONGEVITY and fruitfulness are tied to the health and strength of its roots. I’m deeply grateful for the deep roots of Sojourners. For the past 50 years, Sojourners has provided a countercultural Christian witness for peace and justice. We have been rooted in a commitment to relentlessly making the case that faithful discipleship involves a transforming and redemptive relationship with Christ, which then empowers and enlists us to serve as change agents in the world to advance God’s reign of peace, justice, and radical love.

Martin Luther King Jr. captures the ethos and charism of Sojourners in his sanctified remix of Romans 12, in which he proclaims that the “saving of our world from pending doom will come not through the complacent adjustment of a conforming majority but through the creative maladjustment of a nonconforming minority.” Sojourners’ 50-year history is full of examples of creative maladjustment and transformed nonconformism—from our founders’ early opposition to the Vietnam War, which led to them being pushed out of divinity school and starting The Post-American (the precursor to Sojourners magazine), to our prophetic actions to end the nuclear arms race and seek peace in Central America, our work in the anti-apartheid struggle, our efforts against the war in Iraq, our current battles against voter suppression, and so many more.