In
his anguish [Job] reaches out for God; God
eludes him, but Job still trusts in his
goodness....
This is the book's lesson: faith must remain
even
when understanding fails. --Introduction to the
Book
of Job in The Jerusalem Bible
"I'm an agnotheist,"
explained a technological management consultant, formerly a full-time manager in
a high-technology firm. "You are what?" I asked. "An agnotheist.
On the good days, I say
I can't know God. On the bad days,
I say there is no God to know. It's
just like my job search--on a good day, I'm convinced that there is a job out
there; I just can't find it. On the
bad days, I'm convinced there is no job to be found."
During World War II, it
was often remarked that "there are no atheists in foxholes." During the corporate downsizing of the
late 1980s and early 1990s, I ran into only this one "agnotheist," but I found a
diverse group of atheists, pietists, devout believers, secular humanists and
religious pragmatists occupying their isolated foxholes and observation posts in
the campaign for jobs. For the most
part, the job-seekers I met are men and women of faith. Most of them identify with and find
support in organized religion. Some, however, who classify themselves as believers, look upon religion
as a faraway, stained-glass abstraction with which they did not connect in the
past, and to which they do not care to relate in their present job-seeking
circumstances. They fail to see any
connection or potential benefit. But they do believe in God and turn to God in the midst of their present
troubles associated with job loss. Often, the word "spirituality" drew a response where "religion" failed to
trigger an affirmative nod. As a
female executive who describes herself as Episcopalian/Christian but does not
attend church services put it, "I have a relationship with God that works for
me. I had a difficult childhood and
youth and went to church a lot until adulthood. With that background, my 'conversations'
are important and settling for me. If I didn't have this relationship with God, life would be harsh." A
Catholic transportation CEO, who had been through three transitions in his
career, told me, "My advice to others would be to pray frequently and do
whatever is necessary to posture oneself closer to God."
As one with a personal
anchor in faith and a professional identification with organized religion, I
wondered about the relevance of religion to those caught in the uncertain, often
frightening, mid-career "no-job land" that became familiar territory to so many
dislocated white-collar workers in the 1990s. I assumed that religion would have
relevance for many, if not most job-seekers, and found this to be the case--
approximately two out of three persons in this study. I also assumed that
ministers of religion would, in the main, feel unequal to the task of helping
executives and upper-level managers through the ordeal of a job search, and
found, on the testimony of job-seekers themselves, that this assumption was
also, in general, correct.
I further assumed that
organized religion had not adequately recognized the ministerial opportunity it
has to serve the spiritual needs of men and women whose faith in themselves and
in God is threatened when the bottom falls out of their workaday world. Their familiar reference points are
lost. Their self-esteem is diminished, if not altogether shattered. Their
economic future is in doubt. They fear for themselves and for their
families. They wonder if they will
ever work again. They were thus, it
seemed to me, prepared, although not by their own choosing, for the reassuring
response organized religion can provide. In order to respond to this need, however, ministers of religion must
have a "feel" for the trauma these people have known, and a vocabulary to speak
to them in terms they can understand and appreciate as relevant to their
stressful circumstances. As one of
my respondents expressed the need, "I just don't know how to find my way down
the road with God." Another said,
"I just didn't feel my pastor could relate to my situation." Organized religion, although trying in
many places and many ways to be helpful, has not yet translated its traditional
spiritualities into words and images that address this human need, nor organized
its services effectively to meet these people where they
are.
To their credit, the
churches were "there" to support union-organizing efforts in the 1930s and
remain supportive or organized labor today. Men and women on the other side of the
hyphen that separates labor from management are now also in need of help, even
those whose ouster was cushioned by a "golden parachute." A new kind of ministry is needed
to widen the range of support the churches provide to men and women in (and
trying to get back into) the workplace.
There is an important
place for organized religion in the essential "network" job seekers are
encouraged to build. The church or
synagogue is both a place to go and an assembly of people to meet. Even more important is the faith-based
support religion and spirituality can provide.
A woman who lost her
job as chief administrator of a hospital told me: "Organized religion per
se--i.e., church and pastor--are unable to conceive of the needs and are not
structured to respond or support people like me. My experience is that the church does
not embrace single, professional women, as such--practically or conceptually in
normative terms--so when someone like me is in a situation of change and stress,
there is no response from the church." She did indicate, however, that "prayer, belief in the goodness of God, a
deepening of self-knowledge, and getting to know my own potential through
reflection and meditation, proved to be critical in my becoming a person."
And she added that during the job
transition, "A belief system is critical; it may well help you grow toward new
insight." Another woman, a
Protestant, said, "I don't consider myself a particularly religious person, but
I find my religion and my faith act like a backbone when I'm really down--they
seem to give me strength I didn't know I had."
A 56-year-old
Episcopalian expressed his estimate of the "critical" role or religion in these
words: "If I had not had faith in God, I don't think I could have made it.
Sometimes I needed to pray to have the
strength and courage to pick up the phone to make employment calls. I prayed before interviews.
It was a horrible time in my life. Loss of job is cruel and demeaning to a
person; it is an example of man's inhumanity to man. If employers understood this better,
they might be better managers." Another Episcopalian, age 49, told me that religion had always been a
part of his life. He was convinced
that "spiritual growth came with adversity." He also found that "religion provided
structure--ritual and spiritual. A
faith that works kept me on solid footing emotionally and spiritually when life
became chaos." He acknowledged,
however, that before the "crisis," religion for him had been "an untested
support system." During the
transition, "I embraced a program of spiritual growth based upon God as the
center of life and not religion as an adjunct. Loss of the job was one facet of a
period of enormous change in my life. Without the spiritual focus, I do not believe that religion--as I had
known and employed it--would have sustained me." Still another Episcopalian, a
50-year-old New Yorker took "quiet time" for prayer during the job search and
liked "to stop by a church during a busy day in Manhattan to gain a sense of
solace and comfort."
Speaking of men whose
careers crumble, psychologist Steven Berglas notes: "When their sense of power
is pierced, these individuals often try to recapture it through very
inappropriate means." The
altogether appropriate means of religion is sometimes not taken, I believe,
because before the crisis, religion was not central to the individual's life,
and after the separation, ministers of religion are not there to offer
assistance. The inappropriate
remedies are obvious, and available, and all-too-often taken without a thought
to the possibility of turning to religion instead.
Alfred North Whitehead
defined religion as what a person does with his or her "solitariness." Solitude, as I noted earlier in this
book, is a chosen form of isolation and thus different from loneliness. There is a good deal of loneliness
associated with the job-search; there is also time for solitary reflection with
all the positive benefits such reflection can bring to the inner person, if the
person freely chooses to take this route. The chief executive of a London-based consulting group, a member of the
Church of England, experienced a voluntary separation and transition at age 55
and now runs a company called "Future Perfect--Creating Opportunities for
Life." He told me, "I have found in
our workshop activities, when helping people to plan for the future, that
Christians generally tackle the issue far more positively than
non-believers. They seem to be more
used to looking at themselves, and are less apprehensive about dying." With reference to his own personal
transition, this man said: "My faith has been an instrumental part of the
process, and I see my new role as being a Christian commitment in a pioneering
venture."
The wife of a
high-level executive-in-transition, brought this "Modern Day 23rd Psalm" to the
attention of her husband:
The Lord is my Pace-Setter,
I shall not rush;
He makes me stop and rest for quiet intervals,
He provides me with images of stillness,
which restore my serenity.
He leads me in the ways of
efficiency through
calmness of mind,
And His guidance is peace.
Even though I have a great many things
to accomplish each day,
I will not fret for His presence is here,
His timelessness, His all importance, will
keep me in balance.
He prepares refreshment and
renewal in
the midst of my activity,
By anointing my mind with His oils of tranquility.
My cup of joyous energy overflows,
Surely harmony and effectiveness shall be
the fruits of my hours,
For I shall walk in the pace of the Lord
and dwell in His house forever.
Religion does indeed
have a role in the business of the typical job campaign. It enables many to endure the stress of
the job search. It can help a
person deal with the "loss-of-control" anxiety that is so well known to the
displaced manager. Religious
reflection and counseling can assist with the essential self-assessment that is
preamble to any successful reconnection for the dislocated executive.
The prefix "re" is used
in ordinary conversation by just about everyone every day. But the "lig" in "religion" is virtually
always etymologically ignored by persons cut off from gainful employment. It is the same "lig" that carries the
meaning in "ligament"--a cord, a connecting line, a tie-in to something strong,
firm, and permanent. Religion
reconnects a dislocated creature to the Creator. The disconnected executive can be helped
enormously by religious faith--the human decision to entrust oneself to God, no
matter what. Blind faith can see
through the human condition. It
sees redemption in the face of failure. Faith illumines self-worth to the
point of suppressing self-doubt. "I
believe in God, and I believe that God believes in me"--a good prayer for anyone
with doubts about the ability ever to reconnect in the job
market.
As a priest, I have had
many opportunities to assist people in distress. Often, I found a reflection from the pen
of John Henry Newman to be effective in lifting the drooping spirits of persons
who have faith, but are burdened with confusion and self-doubt. I will quote that reflection below.
Occasionally, during the course of this
study, I met persons who, I thought, might like to have these words so I sent
them to them, but that did not happen often. I did not approach anyone I interviewed
with the expectation that they wanted to hear anything about religion from
me. I made it clear that I was
simply curious about the relevance of religion to them. To the question on my survey instrument
about the relevance of religion, one respondent just wrote, "None. Sorry!"
When I interviewed her later and
remarked that there was nothing to be sorry about--no offense to me--she
replied, "But I am kind of sorry, you know. My father was Jewish, my mother
Unitarian, and I'm nothing; I wonder about my daughter, She has no religion now, and I can only
hope it works out better for her."
The Shield
In reviewing Alvin
Kernan's Printing Technology, Letters & Samuel Johnson for The Christian Science Monitor (March 4, 1987), Thomas D'Evelyn makes note
of Kernan's observation that
Johnson's bouts of depression, and his anomie,
would
sometimes yield to the activity of reading and
writing books. For Johnson, Kernan
says, "books and the larger world of letters" served the same purpose as
"religion, sermons, and prayers"--"to shield him from
nothingness."
Here is the "shield"
Cardinal Newman would put in the hands of the dislocated manager or any believer
who is in distress and in need of help:
God has created me to do Him some
definite service;
He has committed some
work to me which He has not
committed to another. I have my mission--I may never
know it in this life,
but I shall be told it in the next.
I am a link in a chain, a
bond of connection
between persons. He has not
created me for nothing.
I shall do good, I shall do His work. I shall be an
angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place
while not intending it--if I do but keep His
commandments.
Therefore, I will trust
Him, whatever, wherever I
am. I can never be thrown
away. If I am in
sickness,
my sickness may serve Him; in perplexity, my
perplexity
may serve Him; if I am in sorrow, my sorrow may
serve
Him. He does nothing in
vain. He knows what He is
about. He may take away my
friends, He may throw me
among strangers, He may make me feel desolate, make
my
spirits sink, hide my future from me--still, He
knows
what He is about.
Newman often said, and
really believed, that "We succeed by failing."
Faith, for those who
have it, reduces the pain, and becomes within them an all-consuming trust.
No one can explain it fully, but anyone
who talks to enough job-seekers will see faith-as-trust at work as a sustaining
force in the lives of many. "Without religion," an auto
executive told me, "I would not have been able to endure the pain." A 52-year-old engineering executive
said, "Without the support of religion, I don't know how I would have survived
mentally; losing my job was a real crisis for me." Another respondent, a Presbyterian
healthcare executive, commented: "The tenets of religion that relate to dignity
of the person, the belief that everyone has value, and God's purpose is being
served--even if we don't understand it--provided me with the foundation for
getting on with the next phase of my life." Those words, of course, reminded me of
Newman. But the respondent went on
to say that his financial severance package made it "more palatable" since "the
notion that 'God will provide' does not incorporate one's mortgage
payment." He described the burden
of having to deal with the possibility of losing his home as
"onerous."
A self-described
Baptist "fundamentalist," out of work as a vice president for systems at age 49,
described the relevance of religion to his separation with a simple assertion:
"God is in control! All
things work to good to those called according to His purpose." Another Baptist, an African-American
corporate tax director, 47, spoke of religion as enabling him "to survive
without various material things; possessions have not been the basis of my
happiness."
An experienced
outplacement specialist, a partner in one of the top firms, thought about this
issue and reflected on his experience in counseling clients. "I've not heard much talk about faith
and religion from people I see; I just don't hear it. They believe they
have to make it happen, and they believe in luck!" But he then began to wonder whether some
significant thoughts and feelings were going unexpressed in the conversations he
had been having with clients over the years.
One participant in my
study, a Catholic, certainly didn't talk about religion much during his
transition because, he said, "I had a difficult time going to Sunday Mass; it
was a tough time to sit and contemplate a week of frustration and futility.
My prayer to God was, 'Hey, when are you
going to do something for me?'" It
was different for a 46-year-old accounting executive who lost his partnership in
a major firm: "During the
transition, I attended Mass three or four times a week other than Sunday. I gained a sense of peace at Mass."
Still another Catholic in the survey
group said, "Religion gives you the strength to move through the process with an
optimistic attitude; it helps you avoid pessimism.
For a Presbyterian
perspective, here is an international personnel director, age 56, still in
outplacement: "My faith in the future and in divine intervention keep me moving
toward new situations and not dwelling on the past." As one who has "always felt religion is
the source from which I draw my strength," a regional sales representative who
is Methodist observed, "After a person has gone through the full range of
emotions associated with job loss (and they will), there is no other answer that
fits as well as God's word. He has
been faithful to me as He promised, and I shall always be faithful to Him."
A Jew, who lost a
research management position in a university, and who was still out, spoke to me
of the relevance of "faith," rather than religion: "I lost faith in me and had
to find faith in something or Someone. Once over the 'why me?' aspect, my attendance at services did not really
increase, but my intimate little 'conversations' with G-d did. No voice from a burning bush was
expected, but self-questioning and self-examination sessions were helpful.
The old saying of 'G-d helps those who
help themselves' became more self-evident. This helps me become focused and develop the confidence to continue
searching."
A twice-severed
healthcare CEO carried on a dialogue with God and described it for me in terms
of direct appeal to God--"They're your children too, You know, and You've got to
help me take care of them. I accept
Your will, whatever it is for me, but I'll never stop pleading with you to take
care of my kids."
A 54-year-old lawyer,
separated from his firm and looking for a corporate position, viewed his
"ongoing (almost two-year) experience as a spiritual journey with a profound
meaning for my life." He
experienced, he said, "a conversion--a total commitment to Jesus Christ. I realized all that I had in power,
authority, prestige and money did not fill the void in my life and that
materialism and items associated with it were meaningless." His experience was not so "profound,"
however, as to prevent him from enclosing the following for the amusement of
readers of this book:
A MEMORANDUM
To:
Jesus, Son of Joseph, Woodcrafter
Carpenter Shop,
Nazareth 25922
From: Jordan Management
Consultants, Jerusalem 26544
Dear
Sir:
Thank you for
submitting the resumes of the twelve men you have picked for management
positions in your new organization. All of them have taken our battery of tests. We have not only run the
results through our computer, but also arranged personal interviews for each of
them with our psychologist and vocational
aptitude consultant.
The profiles of all
tests are enclosed, and you will want to study them
carefully.
As part of our service
and for your guidance, we make some general comments, much as an auditor will
include some general statements. This is given as a result of staff
consultation and comes without any additional fees.
It is the staff opinion
that most of your nominees are lacking in background, education and vocational
aptitude for the type of enterprise you are undertaking. They do not have the team concept.
We would recommend that you continue
your search for persons of experience in managerial ability and proven
capability.
Simon Peter is emotionally unstable and given to fits of temper. Andrew has absolutely no qualities of
leadership. The two brothers, James and John, the
sons of Zebedee, place personal interest
above company loyalty. Thomas demonstrates a questioning attitude that would
tend to undermine morale. We feel
that it is our duty to tell you that Matthew has been blacklisted by the Greater
Jerusalem Better Business Bureau. James, the son of Alpheus, and Thaddeus definitely have radical leanings,
and they both registered a high score on the manic-depressive
scale.
One of the candidates,
however, shows great potential. He
is a man of ability and resourcefulness, meets people very well, has a keen
business mind, and has contacts in high places. He is highly motivated, ambitious, and
responsible. We recommend Judas
Iscariot as your controller and right hand man. All of the other profiles are
self-explanatory.
We wish you every success in your new venture.
Not for Everyone
The range of responses
received to my inquiry about the relevance of religion moved from blank space on
the questionnaire to a curt "not relevant;" up a step to this kind of neutral
zone: "I consider myself a religious person but religion did not play a greater
or lesser role in my life during the period of severance and job search;" and
then up another notch to a guarded "my strong inner faith and a belief in a
higher being lending me support convinced me that I would eventually get back on
track and find employment." There
were, of course, examples of very high religious commitment and total dependency
upon God expressed in words like these from an out-of-work California banking
executive, a Roman Catholic: "So
there I was at home scared almost out of my wits. What to do? On Marge's dresser there's a crystal
statue of Mary with Child. I simply
got down on my knees and with arms outstretched I prayed the most fervent rosary
I knew how. When I finished, I felt
somewhat at peace. I stood up and
headed to the bathroom to get dressed. I took two or three steps and the phone rang.
It was the CEO of a bank in New
York. We had talked a month before,
but it looked like a failure was at hand, and so we broke off discussions.
Now he wanted to know how soon I could
join him in the rescue effort. I
was there in a week and there was joy in Mudville. Did Someone intervene?
I'm comfortable with my answer to that
question."
Another high-commitment
response, this one also from a banker whose transition took him out of the
industry into another as vice-presidency for administration, took this
form: "I am blessed with having
good faith. This faith and my close
association with my parish and pastor were very instrumental. I used my pastor to cry on more than
once. I talked often to God and to
my Dad who passed away in 1986. I
am convinced that God was listening and my Dad was up there lobbying on my
behalf. I truly feel my faith is
stronger for having gone through this experience. I feel my bond with my family is
stronger as well. It was a sobering
experience that forces you to reflect upon your priorities of work and
family."
A Catholic lawyer, 43,
whose career was corporate with a specialization in taxation, would, from his
resume, be assumed to be cerebral and reserved in the realm of religion. Not so.
I will let him speak for
himself:
If you define religion as
my relationship with
God, it was very important to me. At all times during
the transition, I felt that God was in charge. I was
willing to do whatever came, including a change of
life. I put my life and my
family in God's hands.
I have found that daily
prayer makes me a nicer
person. Under these trying
circumstances, prayer
was all the more important, especially in helping
me
not to get bitter or take offense at criticism. When
I did take offense, prayer helped me to forgive
very
quickly.
The summer before I
received the news of my
severance, I was on a lake fishing late at night in
conversation with the Lord. I had been having a
running dialogue with Him for years. I felt that He
wanted me to keep a written record of the lessons He
had taught me over the years. It was an irregular
effort on my part--mostly in journal form--that
would
start and stop with my changing moods. After admitting
my recent laxness in writing, I heard, clear as day,
"What do I have to do--take your job away?" I had long
ago stopped making deals (that I knew I wouldn't
honor)
with the Lord.
I simply said, "Why do that? I'll try
to write more."
When I was told of the
decision two-and-a-half months
later, I was immediately, mentally, back on the
lake:
"OK, but I need to support your grandchildren." There
was no animosity, and I am still not as faithful to the
writing process as I
should be.
After reading that, you
will not be surprised to learn that during his transition this job-seeker began
each day "with prayer--especially for myself, my family, and the individuals for
whom I used to work."
The briefest and,
possibly, the most positive response I received regarding the relevance of
religion came from a senior broadcast communications executive for whom religion
was, in his one word, "Everything," during the separation crisis.
More typical and more
Main Street traditional was this reply: "Our religious roots, combined with the
loving support of family and friends, were most important during this time of
stress and change. Our faith that
'this, too, shall pass' and that God has a plan into which all this will fit was
our foundation of hope. It is my responsibility to work hard and smart in forming an action plan to
pass through this employment transition."
A Savings & Loan
executive who lost all retirement benefits when his institution was forced to
close in 1991, told me: "Religion was very relevant to me when I experienced the
severance from the job. The callous
way in which the severance was handled by a major corporation was
devastating. If I had not had a
strong faith in God that I would be fine, that He would see me through it, and
that I would in fact be a better person for having experienced it (humility), I
would not have been able to focus so strongly on a job search. I sought and obtained a position with a
not-for-profit organization that has provided me with more job satisfaction than
I ever experienced previously."
A woman who described
herself as being for many years "agnostic or atheistic," noted that the
severance experience provided "more faith that there is a guiding hand assisting
me." She became a Unitarian in 1984
and developed an interest in Eastern religions. When she lost her job in 1992, she
"reframed the experience on a spiritual level, realizing that I should have left
this unhealthy workplace long ago; because I was afraid to leave, I got a
'nudge' and an opportunity to change." She had years earlier, she said, "been prone to anxiety and worry."
When job loss occurred, "Amazingly, I
felt very little anxiety or worry, rather I felt a sense of freedom and
anticipation of a more fulfilling lifestyle. Even though my income [as a private
consultant] is way down now, I consider myself happier and more relaxed than
ever." Another woman personalized
both her religion and her response this way: "My spiritual communication with my
God became more honest, and more clear as I was being more true to myself at my
essence where I experience my God." A Catholic nun, who found herself unceremoniously separated by a
lay-religious board from the CEO position at a large hospital, later reflected:
"As I prayed for peace and less anger, I knew in faith this action was a part of
the Lord's larger plan for me. It
was difficult to understand why those religious women in authority would not
stand up for justice, so I had to work through that. However, as time passed, I became more
independent and secure in who I was as a result of meeting some beautiful people
along the way." She is now happily
at work in another hospital in another part of the
country.
A sales executive in
California who identifies himself as Christian-Presbyterian suffered an
employment setback at age 54. Three
years later, when asked to put that experience in religious perspective, he
said, "I have been justified and sanctified--the Lord Jesus Christ died for
me. He will deliver me, but I must
put forth every effort to reach my goal. But I recognize that I cannot do anything without Him.
My mother died during this time and I
was reminded by my best friend (a pastor in a distant city) of my mother's
favorite hymn--'Life Is Like a Little Mountain Railroad." Time with him before and after her
memorial service was valuable."
When released from the
presidency of a beverage company, a Catholic in my study found that his religion
enabled him to "feel like I was being taken care of and protected." An evangelical Christian, once an
academic administrator and now a consultant, said, "I have always been able to
trace God's hand in everything that has happened to me vocationally." A transportation CEO, a Methodist,
discloses something of his approach to religion in this comment: "Since the
separation experience was not traumatic or disheartening, religion was no more
or less relevant than under normal conditions." A self-described "Christian," age 39,
had been a vice president and project manager for a construction company, but
was unemployed when he related the following to me: "Recovery in a 12-step group
led me to a spiritual conversion and then to a personal Christian conversion in
1982. These experiences laid the
foundation for a personal faith that has sustained me with a sense of hope and a
belief that I will fulfill His plan for my life."
"I believe in the power
of prayer," said a corporate communications director who found new employment in
healthcare public relations. "It
is, and was, a source of great comfort. I feel that God gave me the tools to build a life, and that the results
are up to me. Religion and faith
provide for me the ethical context for decision-making." A similar view was expressed in slogan
fashion by a marketing executive: "Let Go and Let God." He added, "I put my life and my will in
the hands of God, and I trust Him."
Jewish participants in
my study tended to be more taciturn in matters of religion. For some, their declared religious
commitment, like that of some of their Christian counterparts in the study, had
little relevance to the job-search process. Others, like this former executive vice
president, said simply: "I have always felt that G-- does things or has things
happen to you for a reason. Therefore, this situation occurred for a reason and we must face it and
make the best of it." Another Jew,
a successfully repositioned vice president for human resources, noted, "You have
to put your faith in G-d that something good will come out of this
situation."
For the person of any
faith, religion has a reassuring answer to Eli Wiesel's question, "What is
man? Hope turned to dust, or dust
turned to hope?" Hope fuels the
fight against discouragement; it keeps a focused job-search moving forward. It
enables the job-seeker to "dance without music."
A voluntary separation
experience, and what proved to be its disappointing aftermath, has had an
unanticipated religious repercussion in the life of a 55-year-old executive.
"Externally, I went out with grace--head high; but the symbol of victory, a golf
villa in Florida, proved to be unsatisfying to my wife." So he sold it and they returned
north. "I've been oriented to
achieve, to 'declare victory.' I
approached religion in the same way--emphasis on the victory, not the
process. I'm not as comfortable as
I used to be. I always assumed I
could lean back on religion, but now I find it to be less of a crutch and more
of a challenge. I used to think of
it as a bank where I could make deposits and withdrawals. Now it is making demands of me.
It's fuzzier now. I'm angry with this Christ person who
seems to be asking too much." For
this man, religion in the sense of "wrestling with God" is more of a factor
now. He thought he was going to
"pack it all in and enjoy the victory." He remains strongly faith-committed but uneasy about where the faith
journey is taking him. (The image
of the believer as "wrestler" reminds me of Walker Percy's words, "Life is a
mystery, love is a delight," an expression he elaborated upon as follows: "I
don't see why anyone should settle for anything less than Jacob, who actually
grabbed aholt of God and wouldn't let go until God identified himself and
blessed him.")
In a similar
deposit-and-withdrawal vein, another participant in my study explained: "My religion has always been
my foundation for my life. This
trial [involuntary separation] was no different from other trials in the sense
that I depended on my faith to strengthen me. As always, it did not fail me.
I believe you get out of it what you put
into it. If you remain faithful to
God and to His laws, He will be faithful to you. So far, this compact has been kept on
God's side very well."
Typical of the
religious reaction of a lot of couples--all Christian--where one or the other
lost a managerial job, is this comment voiced by a successful executive of 62
who was 49 at the time of involuntary separation: "God has always been an
important part of our lives and we have been risk takers. We had confidence in ourselves and
included God in our plans, but we didn't expect Him to provide." One risk-taker decided not to look for
another job but to head off "in another direction"--making personal investments
in small companies. "My religious
experience gave me the strength to believe it would all work out."
"The loss of status,
the insult to my ego, the fear and uncertainty actually caused me to think of
death and dying," disclosed a 57-year-old Christian who did not attend any
church services regularly and still does not. But with the loss, came a
"spiritual awakening that helped me put my relatively minor problems in
perspective." He turned to the
psalms, the Book of Proverbs, and the gospels, and appears to be content in his
present capacity as consultant to venture capitalists. He keeps his distance, however, from
formal religion.
Because he and several
others mentioned the psalms as sources of help, I decided to edit a
"user-friendly" version of the psalms for job-seekers; it has been published by
Sheed & Ward under the title Take Courage; Be Stouthearted: Psalms
of Support and Encouragement.
"Does the Book of Job Have My Name on It?"
One of the most
depressed and certainly the angriest person I encountered in the course of this
study lost his marriage as well as his job, and twice came within a whisker of
taking his life. He is, relatively
speaking, back on track now ("I reserve the right to hate my former boss") in
another industry and occupation. It
was his religious background (Roman Catholic), he told me, that prevented him
from committing suicide. "I just
knew I could not face God; I thought He'd destroy me." He had for years, he said,
"intellectualized God; now the relationship is pretty raw." Given his religious background, he said,
he expected that "people would treat me fairly." "I always wanted to make a positive
contribution--that phrase kept returning while I was down, and out of
work."
Like several others in
this study, this troubled job-seeker mentioned the Book of Job; identification
with Job was easy for him. He used
to argue with God, he told me, and recalled walking down the street one day,
both jobless and optionless, and saying to God, "You don't think I can take
this, do you? Well, make it
tougher!"
Interestingly enough,
the phrase from the Book of Job that rang deep and true for him was, as he
repeated it, "No one asked his counsel." He found this to be, he said, "so true when you are out of work, and this
really hurts." The reference in the
text is, however, to God, not to Job. "Yet he himself [God] had filled their houses with good things, while
these wicked men shut him out of their counsels" (Job 22:18). In any case, this man thought of himself
as "a target for [God's] archery" (16:13) and he took to heart the Lord's words
to Job to "brace yourself like a fighter" (38:3; 40:2), the stance he chose to
take for his complaints and conversations with God.
The reader of the Book
of Job is alerted in the prologue to the fact that Job's troubles were not of
God's doing, but the work of Satan. The religious message of the book is that God's ways are mysterious, the
mystery of a God of justice who permits good people to suffer. Job's faith and faithfulness are being
tested. As the introduction to this
book in the Jerusalem Bible puts it: "In his anguish he reaches out for God; God
eludes him, but Job still trusts in his goodness.... This is the book's lesson:
faith must remain even when understanding fails."
Another man I
interviewed said he found himself ten years earlier asking himself, "Does the
Book of Job have my name on it?" He
was in outplacement for nine months. Without in any way wanting or deserving it, he was also in "the
Disaster-of-the-Month Club." He had
six months of family and financial problems: an unmarried daughter became
pregnant; ten days later his wife's only sister died unexpectedly while awaiting
brain surgery on her husband; one month later his father died; in April, "the
IRS came after me big time;" and he then discovered that his father, a
physician, had been "covering" his mother's Alzheimer's disease that was now
evident to all and provisions had to be made. "I didn't have any dogs licking my
sores, but Job and I had a lot in common!"
A very reflective and
resourceful person, a former CEO who describes himself as taking a "liberal view
of religion, as seen by my Unitarian affiliation, although I was raised a
traditional Lutheran," said he used "the church process" to "reflect on my life,
values and desires for responsible accomplishments" while going through
transition. But, "I did not push
the process any more or less than normal while going through the
change."
When asked about the
impact of his Catholic religion on his job-loss situation, a Philadelphia banker
said, "What impressed me the most was not the solace I found in my religion, but
how deeply religious the people were who provided the most support to me. People with deep religious beliefs do
reach out to help." Another
banker explained his personal belief that "my talents are a gift" and it is his
responsibility to use them well. "Most of my spirituality comes from 40 years ago," he said, "not from any
recent influences."
After acknowledging to
me that his religion was "very important in terms of support, spirit-lifter,
solace, hope," a senior vice president in advertising who had made a successful
transition, went on to say: "Four years ago, I was out of a job and
hurting. I vowed then to help
others when I found a job." He kept
the promise by hosting, in a corporate headquarters auditorium, a monthly
support group of 50 and providing one-on-one assistance whenever he got a
call. He makes himself available as
a speaker to church-sponsored support groups in the New York area, so much so
that an admiring observer describes this volunteer work as "a
ministry."
Needed: More and Better Help from the Churches
When the 44-year-old
chief financial officer of a Denver-based oil company was separated from his
job, he asked the company to provide "testing that will force me to rethink my
life." He received professional
outplacement assistance and in that setting "saw people who were totally
crushed. It was a tense period for
me." I had asked him about the
relevance of religion in his life at that time and he replied: "None. And it's a damn shame."
His Baptist church disappointed him, he
said, in two ways. First, its
pragmatism in spending a lot on outreach through programs like Alcoholics
Anonymous, while not addressing the unemployment problems of white-collar
workers. "If I didn't have sores
and scabs, they didn't want to help me. They ignore people in three-piece suits carrying attache cases.
I think assistance to people in career
transition--at all economic levels--should be the #1 outreach program of all
churches." He did indeed mean "at
all economic levels," but he and most of the displaced managers I talked to did
not see themselves as in the same boat, much less in solidarity with the
lower-skilled, lower-income unemployed. Many, however, emerge from the experience more sensitive than they
otherwise would have been to blue-collar victims of both cyclical and structural
unemployment.
A highly paid chief
operating officer of a large publishing operation saw his company sold out from
under him and, for the third time in his life found himself, at age 54, looking
for work. Religion was "critical"
to him in each of the searches, he told me. So critical, that he thought the
churches in his affluent northern New Jersey suburban community should be doing
something to help the many displaced executives who were "hiding" in the pews on
Sundays, unknown and invisible to others in the congregation who were
gatekeepers to jobs. He decided to
get personally involved. With the
pastor's permission, he recalled, "I got up one Sunday, went into the pulpit,
and literally demanded that these people crawl out of their closets and come to
see us." He also appealed to
employers in the congregation to post job openings. He set up an outplacement
service on his Catholic parish property (Most Blessed Sacrament Church, Franklin
Lakes, N.J.), but he is quick to point out that "it serves a client group that
is Catholic, Protestant, Jewish and un-churched." There are "a lot of people out
there waiting to take advantage of the unemployed," he told me. "We don't charge
a dime, and they get suspicious about that because they've been running into a
lot of people with their hands out who offer help with the resume, with selling
the house, and that sort of thing." Some lawyer-members of this affluent parish provide pro-bono assistance
in obtaining delays of mortgage foreclosures for about a year. Several foreclosures had occurred, he
discovered, because people were "hiding" and neither neighbors nor parishioners
were aware of the problem.
The parish sets aside
ten percent of its weekly income and puts it into a fund created to help those
in need. Permission was obtained to
apply those funds to the needs of both parishioners and non-parishioners who
participate in the weekly outplacement sessions. Disbursements, based on a private
discussion between the pastor and the person in need of help, take the form of
grants, not loans.
The prime mover in the
support-group activity in Franklin Lakes is himself a person who has had to deal
with involuntary separation. He urges church attendance (any church), as an
expression of gratitude, upon those who participate in the parish program. And,
he claims, there is abundant evidence that the job search brings people back to
regular church attendance.
In another city, it
happened this way for a non-practicing Catholic who found in the local Episcopal
church "a weekly job support meeting which I attended." He went on to recall, "While attending
the weekly meetings at St. Martin's Episcopal Church, I felt a strong attraction
to the nave and sanctuary. In
retrospect, I am certain that this was due to God's grace--in the form of a
swift kick--and the presence of the reserved sacrament on the altar. I started attending church there and was
married there two years later."
Curiously, another
participant in this study, who also founded a parish-based support group for
unemployed managers, preferred to "go it alone" some years earlier when he lost
his executive position. "While I
had a strong faith and commitment to my church, my strength during the
transition was more private. I did
not reach out for support through church activities or spirituality
groups." He is Episcopalian. His experience was not unlike that of a
Catholic telemarketing executive who drew from his religion, "peace of mind in a
time of high anxiety."
A different experience
is reported by the former manager of international corporate finance for a large
bank; he moved into life insurance with the help of Episcopal church-based
friends and later recalled, "Nearly all the friends to whom I turned for help in
my networking effort were members of our church. Ultimately, I found my current job
through an acquaintance at church." His advice: "Be active in your church; it will help you realize how
fortunate you are. It is all
relative. Count your
blessings. Try to do good. Get on with your life. Don't harbor grudges.
Keep your friends from all your old
jobs."
The Career Initiatives
Center (CIC) in Cleveland evolved in 1987 from a Presbyterian congregation's
"Samaritan Network Program," founded in 1984 as a peer-support group for
unemployed managers and professionals. The Samaritan program was based at
Fairmount Presbyterian Church in Cleveland Heights. CIC now has close links with "Job
Seekers," an on-going support group at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Cleveland
Heights. Those responsible for the
program at St. Paul's decided against beginning their weekly sessions with a
prayer because, they explained, they welcome persons from all religions or no
religion at all, and do not want to make anyone feel uncomfortable or excluded.
Religion is not emphasized; but, I'm told, the power of prayer and the
importance of divine guidance are often mentioned by members in open discussion.
The focus of the meetings is on peer support--moral, practical, and often
spiritual--of persons searching for employment. Similarly, CIC has no explicitly
religious elements in its program, although reference to its church-based
origins are included in all descriptive literature, and an obvious faith-based
inspiration motivates those who now run the program. The fee schedule suggests church-related
origins and some operating subsidy. Membership dues are $10.00 per week for the first 30 weeks, and $5.00
weekly thereafter. "Graduates"
contribute a minimum of $100.00 within two months of a successful
job-landing. Additional support
comes from the Cleveland business community, civic organizations, churches, and
individuals. Start-up funding in
1987 came from BP America, Ameritrust, the Episcopal Diocese of Ohio, and
Fairmount Presbyterian Church.
All across the country
there are church-based support groups for unemployed managers and
professionals. They differ by local
custom relative to the integration of prayer and religious practice in the
support process. For the most part,
prayer is absent; any stepped-up frequency or intensity of religious practice is
a private matter. In the vast
majority of cases, clergy are not directly involved with the program, although
they are supportive in providing space and some financial subsidies. Lay participation could easily be
widened to include persons other than the ones looking for work and the
enthusiasts, two or three typically, who spearhead the parish effort. Under the acronym EARN (Employment
Assistance & Resource Network) a Yorktown Heights, N.Y. group, based at St.
Patrick's Parish House, announces in a brochure that the group's "primary
support will come from individuals in our own community who are willing to
volunteer their time and energy in order to extend a helping hand to their
neighbor in need." The support,
provided free of charge, includes: (a) providing encouragement and emotional
support to both the job-seeker and his or her family; (b) identifying and
encouraging participation in job search training; (c) publicizing both job
opportunities and the names of those looking for work; and (d) channeling
resources from within the extended parish community to meet practical needs
associated with the job search.
The potential for
volunteer service focused on this one area of need is great. Church-related volunteer activity is not
as extensive as one might expect. This could be because potential volunteers
fear invading the privacy of those who are unemployed; these support groups do
take on the character of an Alcoholics Anonymous chapter. Sadly, some shy away from the unemployed
as if they were carriers of an infectious disease. But most, I suspect, are uninvolved
because they have not been asked and have no idea how helpful they can
be.
In Chicago, within a few blocks of
The Loop, stands Old Saint Patrick's Church, home to the Crossroads Center for
Faith and Work." Center founder
John Fontana established, at Old St, Pat's, a support group for unemployed white
collar workers. I visited this
group several times and was impressed with the gentle insistence by the
volunteer facilitator, Tom Prost, a retired human resources executive, that
guest presenters--HR people, executive recruiters, psychologists, and other
experts--limit their talks to about 20 minutes so as to allow time for each of
the 40 or so members of the group to say not only a word about their employment
goals, but a few sentences about the strengths they bring to the table, based on
their past training and experience. It was important, in Prost's view, to encourage participants to identify
and focus on their positive attributes, not simply to point to their need for a
job.
Churches and
synagogues, some cooperatively, are trying in virtually all parts of the country
to assist unemployed executives get their bearings and find new jobs. I had noticed less of this kind of
activity, relatively speaking, in the Jewish community, and asked a well-known
rabbi for an explanation. He
pointed out that many Jews are employed in family-owned businesses and they have
other means of resolving business differences and networking re-employment
connections. There were, I noticed,
Jewish participants in the several Christian church support groups I visited;
there are also synagogue settings in the major cities where this kind of
activity goes on. In any case, it would be good, I think, for those who want to bring the
institutions of organized religion closer to the problems, to hear these
comments from one of the more articulate participants in my study. He is a 55-year-old Episcopalian who
lives and works in the New York metropolitan area. He spoke of a "Christian Career Development
Workshop" established by a group at a Presbyterian Church in Greenwich,
Connecticut. The workshop moved
from church-to-church in the new York suburbs. "I first attended it at St. Catherine's
Roman Catholic Church, and then I ran it for about a year at the First
Presbyterian Church in Stamford. Aside from space, the churches contributed nothing to the workshop."
He went on to say, "The workshop did,
however, help me to believe there was a path for me to discover, and it gave me
support as I sought out that path. But the organized churches, as such, were useless in terms of help,
possibly because they had bought into the 'your job/your identity'
syndrome. Many good intentions, but
not a clue in terms of practical help. Interestingly, the churches were cool to the idea of supporting or even
publicizing our Christian Career Development Workshop because of a vague feeling
that 'it does not fit with our ministry.' That has changed greatly in the past five years.
Now many churches have career support
groups--some useful, others only self-pity wallowing pits. Incidentally, I quit the Christian
Career Development Workshop after about a year of leading it, when it was taken
over by some charismatics who felt the message should be 'Believe in Jesus and
He will find you a job.'"
An equally articulate
Catholic, a former trade association president, spoke with similar candor: "I
believe that there is too little connection between what a parish pastor does
day-to-day and the realities of the business world. In particular, the parish to which we
officially belong [suburban Washington, D.C.] was headed at that time by an
individual who followed the charismatic movement and believed it was more
important to hold hands at Sunday Mass than to get down from the pulpit and deal
with the realities of disenfranchised executives such as myself. I personally knew three other
individuals who were in similar circumstances and wondered where the Church was
at their time of need." He had a
lot more to say along these lines, most of which he summarized in a closing
comment: "My point in stating all of this is simply to suggest that the Church
needs to become more involved in presenting some kind of message to the
professional who does not currently have much of a connection with his church
other than Sunday Mass and the weekly contribution."
What I saw in the
course of this study verified that there is a widening opportunity for a
response from religion to the plight of managerial men and women who are
unemployed. The pain of every
jobless person should, of course, be the concern of organized religion. Recent
circumstances have made me aware of all the wilted white collars around these
days, and I've noticed that large numbers of sidelined executives go to church
or synagogue services with fair regularity, even though the institution does not
speak immediately to their need. Significant numbers of unemployed managers say that the church has little
to say to them about the meaning and purpose of life, particularly in the
troubled circumstances of transition through "no-job land." And here again the distinction between
religion and spirituality comes into play. As a 52-year-old former manager of corporate price policy, now an
independent consultant, put it--speaking for himself and his wife--"We are not
'religious' in the sense of any association with any organized religion; that is
something we both consciously reject. We are, however, highly 'spiritual' in terms of our personal relationship
with the Creator."
One critic, a
49-year-old former public affairs executive, calls himself an
"Episcopal-Catholic." In his view,
"organized religion has failed miserably in this area. I can't help but think that this is not
simply an isolated failure, but one that may be systemic in nature." He explains what he means by noting that
"for at least the past 20 years, organized religion--especially the mainline
Protestant and Catholic traditions--has experienced dramatic decreases in active
membership. This would seem to
indicate that overall, organized religion is not meeting the basic spiritual
needs of its members. The failure
to respond to the unemployed is probably just one symptom of a far larger
problem."
Others, without
intending to (because it seems never to occur to them to do so), present a
challenge to organized religion in comments like these, made by a Catholic
woman, age 49, who was let go as a corporate division manager and was just
entering the transition when she told me, "Religion is not important to me.
Spirituality is. As I'm moving toward this change, I
often ask what would God want from me. How might I better serve my purpose in life as I develop a new
business?" Good questions. Organized religion would be wise to
become more involved in developing the substance of a response, and the
vocabulary to convey it.
Representatives of
organized religion can often assist troubled but believing job seekers by
explaining to them the distinction between the positive and the permissive will
of God. Too often, good people
think God is punishing them with misfortune, or if not punishing them, at least
abandoning them in their troubled circumstances. Somehow or other, God "wills" their
present hardship. In this case,
religion has both the substance and the vocabulary for a helpful reply.
Here is how I attempted
to explain it to a mixed group of Christian and Jewish job seekers when the
question came up in a group discussion I had with them at the Career Initiatives
Center in Cleveland. Maybe it is
God's will that you lost your job as you did, or maybe it isn't. You have to distinguish between the
positive will of God--what God really wants--and the permissive will of
God--what God permits because He respects human freedom and refuses to impose His will on yours
or on the will of anyone else, including the person who may have treated you
unfairly. Any one of us can choose
to do something evil or just plain foolish, but we cannot say God wills the
result. God wills that we be free
and wants us to use our freedom wisely. But God will not suppress human freedom and force anyone to do good. Nor
will God reverse the laws of nature and suppress the human consequences of human
acts, or the natural consequences of natural forces--of the law of gravity, for
example, or the laws of learning and of natural growth-and-decline that affect
all living beings. Miracles, of
course, can happen, but God does not ordinarily suspend the laws of nature.
Nor does God prevent unjust people from
doing unjust things even, perhaps, to you. What faith enables you to assert with certitude, however, is the
conviction that God is always with you, at your side, protecting, helping and
loving you, no matter what.
In another setting, I
sketched out these ideas for a 51-year-old whose full-time employment as a
senior marketing executive had ended three years earlier. As a younger man, he told me, he had
begun "to question the seeming conflict between the concept of an almighty and
all-loving God on one hand, and the existence of so much pain and suffering and
evil in the world, on the other." He went on to say, "I resolved the conflict in my own mind through what I
call the concept of non-interventionism. Simply stated, the concept is that since the death of Jesus Christ, God
has chosen not to intervene in the affairs of men. It follows, therefore, that prayer, in
the sense of asking for God's help and influence, is futile. This is not to suggest that God does not
care about man, only that he does not intervene." He then remarked that his concept of
non-interventionism may have some similarities with my notion of God's
permissive will. But the experience
of unemployment, he said, has had a negative impact on his Catholic faith, "the
message of Job notwithstanding."
Ministers of religion
and others associated with institutional religion can learn a lot from those
whose faith sustained them through the ordeal of unemployment, although it is
not to be assumed that this will always be the case, as the
"non-interventionist" conclusion suggests. Here is the testimony of a 37-year-old Catholic, a vice president for
finance who lost a $145,000-a-year job and was, when he wrote this to me, still
looking:
My faith plays an important role in defining my values and
priorities. I know that it allowed
me to leave my position with great dignity and respect. It also provided a basis for
establishing what would be important in my next job. It allowed me to face the severance with
perspective on how "traumatic" this really was. I found myself praying that I allow
myself to be open to the changes and challenges that would be coming, and that I
accept them well. I also wanted to
look to my faith to provide a long-term perspective on the decisions I would be
making.
I
think the severance/re-employment experience has a bit of the
"dying-resurrection" theme to it. My optimism about the opportunities that the "resurrection" could bring
helped allow me to accept the "death" of severance. I also began to redefine what security
and satisfaction really meant to me.
If lay persons looking for work can speak like this
in the vocabulary of organized religion (and many of them can), ministers
wanting to help should not be hesitant about opening up the conversation. When it comes to a discussion about the
relevance of religion to the job-loss situation, both parties to the
exchange--the job-seeker and the minister of religion--have more of substance to
bring to the conversation than they probably realize, and they also have,
perhaps without knowing it, the vocabulary to make the conversation
productive.
Men and women of faith
are out of work and in need of help. Many of them, in my experience most of them, will welcome whatever help
the ministers of religion can provide.