Many Kinds of Work: Hands and Head (Things I learn in Church)

Growing up, Dad would talk to my brother Daniel and me as we walked home from church about how he saw the world. He was a pastor and part of his job was keeping up with world affairs best he could. He was (and is!) a wise man and so often would anticipate issues we both have faced our entire lives.

One strength of all the churches he pastored (and of our own present parish) was that they were a mix of those who worked with their hands and those whose primary work was mental. Our youth pastor as we got older was a Kodak researcher with many patents and an earned doctorate. At the same time, some of our wisest elders were people who did “blue collar” work.

I learned and was taught by people from all kinds of professions and church leadership ran the full spectrum.

Dad had two worries and I hope I recollect them correctly. First, he pointed out that as kids who liked to read, in fact read too much, that we would probably be fine in the world that was coming. Jobs for readers, for people who liked words, would grow. What about our friends who were not so inclined? Wasn’t there equal value in making things? In using our hands?

In fact, given our childhoods, we had to stop and consider (for the first time) that someone might think it better to be a “thinker” and not a “maker.” If anything, I always was sorry that a combination of my vision and clumsiness made me bad at making. I was never good at using tools like my Papaws (both were makers and thinkers!). Who didn’t wish he could fix a door or make a bookcase?

Dad made it plain that the world was changing. Head work was going to be privileged or at least easier to get than it had been. That was comforting, sort of, until Dad pointed out that this was going to be a problem. Why should that be? What about good folk who were not suited to do things we wished to do? What should be done?

I did not know. Dad did not pretend to know. He just pointed out that no human being should ever be treated as “washed up” or “useless.”

The problem went deeper. Both Dad and (especially) Mom began to worry about social separation  in churches, activies, communities between these two groups of people. “Thinking” types started hanging with people just as they were and becoming superior or at least irritated with people who did not approach the world as they did. Simultaneously, was the growth of “hands” people who struck back, (they generally had less cultural power though not always less financial clout!) by despising the nattering class.

Growing up in a church that was both and respected both seemed perilous to me then and now that it is becoming more common, very dangerous.  Dad was right: it has gotten harder for some types of people to get decent jobs. We are wasting their gifts and schools are not set up properly to help. This is a great loss and injustice.

It is a loss, because there are times when intellectualizing first about a problem is not the proper solution. There is wisdom in the person who works out a problem by making (music, crafts, gardens) and chews over the situation in that way. Obviously, some special people do both things well, blessed souls, but most of us lean one direction or the other. For a Christian, wasting any life in a social system that deprives a person of the ability to flourish is unjust. People need meaningful work even when they do not need money!

People who read, think, and ponder mentally also bring great and good gifts to a society. If a group gets cut off from the “thinkers,” then that too will lead to loss and injustice.

There is a weird insularity and impotence in a community where both making and thinking are not valued.

Church, at least, should be a place where all types of people are represented. Look around your congregation: are you mostly from one type of socio-economic class? Or worse, are you diverse in earnings, but all “thinkers” or “doers?” A healthy community will have both types and give support and leadership to all. One group will not always end up as slaves of the other. There is no health when the creatives end up producing bad art for the hands-on folk (who don’t know art, but know what they like and can afford) or when the creatives cease to be tied to a reality where budgets must balance, beds be made, and bridges stand.

Dad and Mom were right. There is much to consider here and much to learn. God help us to think and do, value and fellowship with all His children.