r- -. CATHOLIC Sub1cr1ption1 No. 6 25o Per Year Price le . OLD TRUTHS FOR THE NEW YEAR FROM PETER MAURIN A Bourgeois The Nazis, the Fascists, to make a living: to the capitalists that is what makes man human. is a fellow, who tries to be some- and the Bolshevists Stealing, begging, working." or accumulators of labor. Creed and not greed, body are Totalitarians. Stealing is against the law of God WHAT MAKES MAN HUMAN That is what makes man human. by trying to be The Catholic Worker and against the law of men. Charles Peguy used to say: BETTER OR BETTER OFF like everybody, is Communitarian. Begging is against the law of men, "There are two. things in this The world would be better off, which makes him THE C. P. AND C. M. but not against the law of God. world, if people tried a nobody. The Communist Party Working ls neither against the law politics and mysticism." to become better. of God - , A Dictator cretlits bourgeois capitalism Politics is just politics And people would is a fellow with an historic mission. nor against the law of men. and is not worth bothering about become better . -who does not hesitate The Communitarian Movement "But they say but mysticism is mysterious if they stopped trying,.. to strike you over the head condemns it to be better off. if you refuse to do on general principles. For when i:verybody 'tries what he wants you to do. The Communist Party to become better 'off, A Leader is a iellow throws the monkey-wrench nobody is better off. of class struggle • But when everybody tries who refuses to be crazy into the economic machinery to 1:1ecome better, · the way everybody else is crazy and by doing so . everybody is better off. and tries to be crazy delays the fulfilling Everybody would be rich in his own way, of the historic mission if nobody tried A Bolshevist which it credits to become richer. is a fellow to capitalism. And nobody would be poor who tries to get -Tqe Communitarian Movement if everybody tried what the other fellow has aims to create to be•the poorest. and to regulate a new society And everybody would be what you should have. within the shell of the old what he ought to be A Communitarian is a fellow with the philosophy of the new if everybody tried to be which is· not ' what he wants who refuses to be a new philosophy the other fellow to be. what the other fellow is tiut a very ol' philosophy, BIG SHOTS AND and tries to be a philosophy so old LITTLE SHOTS what he wants him to be. that it looks like new. When the big shots THEY AND WE The Communist Party become bigger shots People say: stands for proletarian dictator- then the little shots "They don't do this, - ship. become littler shots. they don't do that The Communitarian Movement And when the little shots they ought to do this stands for personalist leadership. become littler , shots they ought to do that." WHAT LABOR NEEDS because the big shots Always "They" A Communist CQmmunity become bigger shot~ itn<t never "!" . .n..i~~,,,.,....,o:'~ ·+---r!t""!i t!omtmmiey then the ljttle shots People should say: with a common unity. get mad at the big shots. -- ·._.· ~y are crazy A common belier And when the little shots for doing this is what makes the unity get mad at th'e big shots and not doing that of a community. because the' big shots but I don't need Norman Thomas says that there is no work to do. and is worth all our striving. by becomfug bigger shots to be crazy that "Ramsay MacDonald There is plenty of work to do, To give.and not to take, ' make the little shots they way they are crazy." h but n·o wages. that is what makes man human. littler shots The Communitarian Revolution as failed to give to Labor a philosophy of labor" • . But people do not need To serve and not to rule, they shoot the big shots is basically What Labor needs to work for wages. that is what makes man human. full of little shots. To help and not to crush, a personal revolution. is not economic security. They can offer their services But by shooting the big shots that ls what makes man human. It starts with I What Labor needs as a gift. full of little shots not with They. is a philosophy of labor. To nourish and not to devour, the little shots I One I plus one I CAPITAL AND LABOR that is what · makes man human. do not become big shots, makes two I THREE WAYS TO MAKE And if need be · · "Capital," says Karl Marx they make ,everything all shot. and two I makes We. A LIVING "is accumulated labor, . ta die _and not to live, Christianity has nothing to do "We" is a community Mirabeau says: not for the benefit of the labor­ that is what makes man human. with either modern Capitalism while "they" is a crowd. "There are only three ways ers Ideals and nat deals, (Continued on page 7) but for the benefit of the accu­ mulators." And Capitalists succeed Farmer in ''P ·sy~ho · '' Rawhide & Axle Gre·ase in accumulating labor By . JIM MILORD by treating labor . By RICHARD FICHTER not as a gift, The peacetimE.! draft, surplus more "trunk" roads which haul but as a commodity, (Cont. from Dec. issue) at the office which he had attended storages and shrinking credit added cross-country. The Belt's name buying__it as any other commodity As I lay on Il!y bed under the too l few days ago. Some said I had . up to a gloomy employment pic­ was literal. It circled the city and at the lowest possible price. bright lights, a tall lanky' man overstepped my rights while ture in the Spring of 1949. I environs tying up freight trans­ came and wanted to talk. I gave others said I had an inner compul­ found myself aloftg with a million ferr.·ng to Eastern states and loads And organized labor him a good welcome and he began sion. I told him God moves in others without a job. Every month from the East to the West whose plays into the hands t€1ling me how lonely he wi;is. He mysterious ways his wonders to the reports would send the jobless terminals were in Chicago. of the ·capitalists said he had terrible thoughts of perform. He was -of the Jewish roll an'tt unemployment claims ris­ I was hired· out as a carman's or accumulators of labor· dying. .He feared his own body,' ,£aith but said I had helped him ing by the tens of thousands. The helper trainee. Twenty other re­ by treating their own labor and the sky and moon. He de- with my message of love instead old lay-off purge was on alright. cruits joined me on the repair not as a gift, pended greatly upon his wife and of fear. r told him he, too, had I found myself rather addicted to tracks (the Rip) as a class where but as a commodity, in her absence felt fear. His wife helped me. 'r then asked him if selling it as any other commodity the pastime of eating and k~eping the baffling but exciting world of had signed him in today at his own he wanted me to rub his back housed and with our first baby interchange and cryptology was ex­ at the highest possible price. request because of his fears. He again so he could return to sleep. coming along shortly there was lit­ plained. iELLING THEIR LABOR had been here before and had Th'. s I - did. He then said he was tle time fGr dallying around wait­ We spent eight weeks there re­ received ·shock treatments. Will going to ask me a terrible thing ing for something to break. Our pairing cars and learning how to And when the capitalists you think I ao:i wicked if I tell you to do-would I pray that his life budget call.ed for steady work. inspect loaded and unloaded cars or accumulators of labor I don't want to wake- up in the be taken before he awakened in the have accumulated so much By .a fortunate bit of timing with for .defects. No car can leave an morning, he said. He asked i ~ I morning. I told him that it was a loss of only three weeks without interchange point without an OK of the laborer's labor was afraid and I said "No, Love -not my privilege to pray that his a pay envelope, I drifted into the written on the side of the car in that they no longer casts out fear." life be taken. That was only within Chicago Belt Railway hiring office chalk by an inspector. This ac­ find it profitable He could Pot · understand my the- province of God. He then at a period of labor upheaval. The counts for all those multi-colored to buy the laborer's labor lack · of fear of anything but God began to pray for himself. Hear, non-ops--derks, m.gssengers, ma­ syllabics you have -seen on boxcars. then the laborers of whom ! ,have a respectful fear. 0 Israel, the Lord God is One. He chinists, roadhouse men, towermen, If the car had broken ladders can no longer He could not understand my inner repeated it in Hebrew and it repairmen and what not were go­ (grab irons), flat wheels, broken sell thei~ labor pf.ace without fear.