Three members of the clergy describe the faith roots of activism for worker justice.

Imam Mujahid Ramadan
Masjid-As-Sabur Mosque
Las Vegas, Nev.

Employers in Las Vegas who don't treat their workers with respect, who try to weasel out of paying fair wages or who try to exploit the fears of immigrant workers are likely to get a visit from one of several members of the Las Vegas Interfaith Council for Worker Justice.

Mujahid Ramadan says that could be a rabbi, a priest, a minister or an imam like himself. Sometimes, he says, several clergy members could call on an employer.

"When you get a rabbi and an imam together, that's a combination most people are not used to. When it comes from more than one faith, there is a richness in our explanations about treating people fairly and one's moral and spiritual responsibility," explains Ramadan, imam at Masjid-As-Sabur temple and one of the founding members of the Las Vegas Interfaith Council.

People of faith, "joined together with the unions, form a very basic message about fairness. It's an excellent combination—a jab, a hook and a right cross," says Ramadan, who along with his spiritual duties also runs a boxing gym.

"I think without proselytizing, without beating employers over the head with scriptures, we have a significant effect just explaining the social dynamics. Sometimes employers are so preoccupied with making money they forget about their social responsibility," he says.

Ramadan has reached into the Koran and Islamic beliefs to try to convince employers in disputes with roofers, hotel workers, carpenters and other construction workers that there is a code of conduct that may not be written by lawyers and lawmakers, but that does carry weight.

"There must be justice in terms of the relationship between the employer and the employee, and there has to be some degree of equity. In Islam we have a saying that the laborer should be paid by the employer before the sweat on his brow dries. We also talk about justice as it relates to being fair as to what is paid."

When he is not ministering to his congregation, fighting for worker justice or training pugilists, Ramadan extends a helping hand as director of Nevada Partners, a job training and placement organization for new immigrants, disadvantaged youths and former prisoners.

Rabbi Robert Marx
Hakafa Congregation
Glencoe, Ill.

Just as some people avoid the dentist, Rabbi Robert Marx says it's not unusual for employers to duck appointments or meetings requested by clergy from the National Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice.

"It's very often frustrating, but when we do arrange a meeting, we'll talk about basic moral rights. If the dispute is based on medical insurance or health care, we might say, 'Your workers are people with families to take care of and we understand that you've just been given huge salary increases, but your workers' salaries remain unchanged and they can't afford medical care like you can. The Bible says to remember the stranger, put yourself in the stranger's place and treat him as you would treat yourselves.' Sometimes they'll see the light," Marx says.

But in the more than 10 years since he and other Chicago faith leaders established the Chicago Interfaith Committee on Worker Issues, which led to NICWJ, Marx says the workers' religious allies usually have had to rely on other tactics.

"We'll send reluctant employers a letter, outlining the workers' concerns and why those are our concerns too. We also let them know we can call upon our synagogue and church people to come out and protest and demonstrate. Threatening action works to varying degrees," Marx says.

Then sometimes they just take their commitments and faith to the streets."We'll have actions and protest at worksites, like we did at Dominick's [a Chicago-area grocery store] for the strawberry workers," who are fighting for a voice at work with California strawberry growers. Marx and his committee colleagues also recently mobilized for workers at a large commercial bakery who were trying to win a voice at work to address unsafe and unsanitary working conditions.

Not all of the council's work is directed at employers. Marx says the group has been working on an outreach program to make workers aware of the U.S. Department of Labor programs and tools for protecting their lawful workplace rights.

The 73-year-old "and still going strong" rabbi is also a member of the national board of the NICWJ and has traveled the country to fight for Justice for Janitors, a voice at work for poultry workers and respect and dignity for immigrant workers.

Rev. Nancy Anderson
Minnehaha United Church of Christ
Minneapolis, Minn.

One fall morning in 1998, a group of people bowed their heads in prayer in the lobby of the Regency Plaza Hotel in Minneapolis. The seven clergy and union members from the Twin Cities Religion and Labor Network were there to persuade the hotel's new management to treat their workers with respect and dignity and to honor the existing union contract.

The Rev. Nancy Anderson, pastor of the Minnehaha United Church of Christ, said the new owners not only refused to abide by the contract with Hotel Employees & Restaurant Employees Local 17, but also had fired workers and were forcing the remaining workers to take on additional duties.

"We handed the manager a letter about why we were there—we wanted them to honor the contract and hire back the fired workers. And we told him what we were going to do," Anderson recalled. "He said, 'You can't do that, I'm going to call the police.' I asked him, 'You mean you don't allow prayer in your hotel?' "

The seven stayed and prayed without much fear of being busted, Anderson chuckled. One of the union members used his cell phone to call a police dispatcher friend who, when told the prayer session would last about 15 minutes, responded, "If we get a call, I don't think we could get there in 15 minutes."

As word spread about the workers' plight and the mobilization by the Religion and Labor Network, the morning lobby prayer vigils kept growing. "We'd show up each morning with more people and the workers started smiling when they saw us. On the fifth day we had about 50 people and that's when management agreed to honor the contract and rehire the other workers," she said.

The union/clergy alliance in the Twin Cities has focused mainly on the struggles of hotel workers and nursing home employees, Anderson said. While most abusive employers studiously avoid meeting with religious leaders, Anderson recalled one nursing home employer who encouraged a visit.

"It was all a P.R. thing. They wanted to show me how wonderful the nursing home was," she said. "I got the tour and they took me into a meeting with their lawyers and tried to indoctrinate me. Hey, I've been around way too long to be indoctrinated."

In fact, the 55-year-old pastor, who came to the ministry in midlife and has been ordained for a decade, knows a bit about the nursing home industry from her two years in the employ of Beverly Enterprises, one of the nation's largest and most anti-union nursing home chains.

"I certainly didn't fit in, but I learned a lot about how they operate," she said.

Anderson knows quite a bit about hotel workers, too, having worked for three years as a cocktail waitress and member of HERE Local 17 right after college. Most of her post-college and pre-seminary work life was spent working for progressive nonprofit agencies.

Anderson's work life and her theological training have shown the common beliefs and goals shared by the union and religious communities—but many employers don't get the connection. When they tell her clergy people and religious leaders ought to be spending their time ministering to their flocks back at their churches or synagogues, she has an answer:

"Part of ministering to our flocks is to ensure they are treated with respect, with dignity. That's both the biblical and union image of how workers should be treated. We in the religious community believe in the right of workers to organize. In fact, many of us believe it is the responsibility of workers to organize."