“As a body is one though it has many parts, and all the parts of the body, though many, are one body, so also Christ” (1 Corinthians 12:12).
St. Paul’s exhortation on unity and diversity as found in 1 Corinthians 12 is a very familiar passage. Yet I wonder how many of us think of work in the world of business vocationally, or, what’s more, as a truly noble vocation? The world of business is often characterized in the starkest Darwinian terms, as dog eat dog and as fit only for those ready to do whatever it costs personally to get ahead. Sadly, many even relish this characterization of business activity, admiring the stereotypical business tycoon for their ability to assert control and dominate as they build their economic empires. To be sure, in a fallen and broken world such as ours, the world of business and economics is sadly appropriately characterized in this way. Nevertheless, in his latest encyclical, Fratelli Tutti, Pope Francis asserts that
Business activity is essentially ‘a noble vocation, directed to producing wealth and improving our world.’ God encourages us to develop the talents he gave us, and he has made our universe one of immense potential…Business abilities, which are a gift from God, should always be clearly directed to the development of others and to eliminating poverty, especially through the creation of diversified work opportunities (Fratelli Tutti, 123).
As Catholic business leaders, many of us are blessed with the gift of administration (cf., 1 Cor 12:28), and, although it is important to reflect on and discuss our unique gifts, it is also important to understand how those gifts fit into the whole of the Mystical Body of Christ, that is the Church, and our responsibility to make an offering of our gifts for the sake of the Church and the salvation of the world. Just as God the Father gives us the sacrificial offering He desires us to offer to Him, i.e. the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of His Son in the Eucharist, so too, we are given gifts to offer with our lives.
The Church is Not a Club
By virtue of our baptism, we are members of the Mystical Body of Christ on earth. We are living stones of a spiritual house (cf., 1 Pet 2:4-5) and no longer belong to ourselves, but to one another (CCC 1267, citing Eph. 4:25). Our belonging to the Body of Christ is a Eucharistic belonging, i.e., an intimate share in Jesus Christ’s Self-gift. It is a belonging that is not confining, that is not limiting in any way, such as “belonging” to an exclusive club that requires payment of dues and the adherence to specific criteria. Rather, belonging to the Body of Christ is liberating and, necessarily, inviting. To clarify, in the event the exclusive club analogy is met with the protest that our participation in the Body of Christ does include obligations, such as our Sunday obligation and cleanliness from mortal sin to receive Holy Communion, it is important to understand the theological depth of such obligations. Such obligations are not simply requirements for club membership. Instead, these obligations speak to the deepest core of the human person; failure to adhere to these obligations is not the infringement of the rules of group participation, instead failing to abide by these practices harms the Body of Christ just as malnutrition affects every system in our bodies, not only our stomachs. For this reason, St. Paul writes of the Body of Christ, “If [one] part suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if one part is honored, all the parts share its joy” (1 Cor 12:26).
Daily Offering
Given our diverse gifts, the question naturally begs, what does our belonging to the Body of Christ look like? Or, said differently, how do we participate in the Body of Christ when we are not at Mass or praying the liturgy?
St. Francis de Sales provides some guidance here as he writes to Philothea:
Devotion must be exercised in different ways by the gentleman, the worker, the servant, the prince, the widow, the young girl, and the married woman. Not only is this true, but the practice of devotion must also be adapted to the strength, activities, and duties of each particular person. I ask you, Philothea, is it fitting for a bishop to want to live a solitary life like a Carthusian? Or for married men to want to own no more property than a Capuchin, for a skilled workman to spend the whole day in church like a religious, for a religious to be constantly subject to every sort of call in his neighbor’s service, as a bishop is? Would not such devotion be laughable, confused, impossible to carry out? … No, Philothea, true devotion does us no harm whatsoever, but instead perfects all things (Introduction to the Devout Life, 32).
As Christian business leaders, what St. Francis de Sales is saying to us is that our business duties ought not be siloed off from our religious duties, as though we were merely changing hats from one day of the week to another (or, worse, one moment to another). Rather, the whole of our lives ought to be thought of as one complete offering to God the Father, through, with and in Christ. Oftentimes we feel heavy carrying our busy schedules, balancing our roles as parents, spouses, business professional, and, above all, future saints. It is there in the muckiness of our lives that we discover a precious jewel (Matt 13:45-46).
For all [the laity’s] works, prayers, and apostolic undertakings, family and married life, daily work, relaxation of mind and body, if they are accomplished in the Spirit– indeed even the hardships of life if patiently born– all these become spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. In the celebration of the Eucharist these may most fittingly be offered to the Father along with the body of the Lord and so, worshipping everywhere by their holy actions, the laity consecrate the world itself to God, everywhere offering worship by the holiness of their lives (CCC 901).
You see, the Church, in Her great wisdom and love, has freed us from our burdens (cf., Matt 11:28-30), because through the gift of grace She transfigures the whole of our lives into a worthy and participatory sacrifice to God through Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world. And, when we approach our business and economic activity in this way, we contribute to transforming the world so that it becomes more like the place God created it to be, what Pope Francis calls, a civilization of love (see., e.g., Laudato Si, 232).
Your sister in Christ,
Vanessa Crescio is an accountant with Lipic’s Engagement in Saint Louis, MO. She holds an MBA from the University of Notre Dame and an MTS from Newman University. She is interested in thinking through co-responsibility in the Church and developing leadership programs to form Catholics to serve the Church with not only their knowledge, skills, and abilities but with the servant heart of Christ.