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<\/a><\/p>\nOn a Monday afternoon, I swung the door open into a Waffle House.\u00a0 To my surprise, I was the only customer.\u00a0 I sat at the bar.\u00a0 Before the waitress approached me, the cook looked over my way and asked, \u201cdo you know what you want?\u201d\u00a0 I always know what I want at Waffle House.\u00a0 I ordered my usual All-Star Special with hashbrowns, bacon, and a regular waffle directly from the cook.\u00a0 As he began to work on my order, the waitress brought me a drink, and proceeded to wash some dishes on the opposite side of the counter from where I sat.\u00a0 She was singing happily song after song.\u00a0 A lady walked in, she appeared to be the girlfriend or wife of the worker who was mopping the opposite side of the store.\u00a0 As she departed, he said to her, \u201csee you later, love.\u201d<\/p>\n
I said to the waitress, \u201cthis is the first time I am the only customer at a Waffle House.\u201d\u00a0 She looked at me with a smile and replied, \u201cwelcome to Garden City.\u201d\u00a0 Artificial Intelligence reports when you Google \u201cWaffle House\u201d that the restaurant is casual, not romantic and not upscale.\u00a0 At the close of the year 2024, there were 445 Waffle Houses in the state of Georgia, or about one store per 23,800 Georgia residents.\u00a0 We in the Peach State are quite familiar with highway exits with two locations, so whichever way you turn, you will look up to find the recognizable yellow squares with the large black letters inside.<\/p>\n
I was struck by the joy expressed by the waitress that Monday afternoon.\u00a0 \u201cIf only everyone were that happy while working,\u201d I thought.\u00a0 Saint Josemaria Escriva noted in his meditation book Furrow<\/em> that \u201cwork is man\u2019s original vocation.\u00a0 It is a blessing from God, and those who consider it a punishment are sadly mistaken (#482).\u201d\u00a0 Through work, every human person imitates God who in the Book of Genesis worked for six days to fashion the universe, and then rested on the seventh.\u00a0 The ability to work is one thing we have in common with God.\u00a0 Saint Josemaria further wrote that \u201cJesus spent thirty-three years in silence and obscurity; in submission and work (#485).\u201d\u00a0 Jesus was the carpenter\u2019s son, and himself a carpenter.\u00a0 Work is part of being a human person, and even God incarnate did not deem work to be beneath him.<\/p>\nThe Polish Cardinal who was a mentor to Pope John Paul II, Archbishop Stefan Wyszy\u0144ski, wrote that \u201cwork is not so much a sad necessity, not only a rescue from hunger and cold, but it is a need for the rational nature of man who comes to know himself fully and expresses himself completely through work (The Spirit of Human Work<\/em>, Wyszy\u0144ski).\u00a0 The challenge of modernity is that work has been reduced to tasks, making it difficult for the worker to find a sense of fulfillment that comes from a job well done.\u00a0 Installing a part for eight hours in an assembly line does not bring the same fulfillment as creating a product from scratch, yet as human beings who are called to work, we have the resilient ability to find God\u2019s presence even in the most menial of jobs, because the value of work comes from the subject performing the work, the worker.\u00a0 All work can be a path to holiness, because it is the work of an individual called to holiness by imitating God the creator.<\/p>\nPerhaps the waitress at the Garden City Waffle House is unable to explain the source of her joy, but it was evident to me that the joy came from her performing her job well.\u00a0 Work is not a necessary evil, but rather an invitation to be more like God.\u00a0 Work allows us to grow in holiness in the measure that we imitate God.<\/p>\n
Picture from the Creative Commons. \u00a0See link here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On a Monday afternoon, I swung the door open into a Waffle House.\u00a0 To my surprise, I was the only customer.\u00a0 I sat at the bar.\u00a0 Before the waitress approached me, the cook looked over my way and asked, \u201cdo you know what you want?\u201d\u00a0 I always know what I want at Waffle House.\u00a0 I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2533,"featured_media":7849,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[217],"tags":[30,2398,2395],"class_list":["post-7846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article","tag-catholic","tag-waffle-house","tag-work"],"yoast_head":"\n
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