This Labor Day weekend, two local Jewish congregations are joining with 30 area congregations of different faiths to learn what religious texts have to say about worker rights issues.

Labor in the Pulpits/on the Bimah/in the Minbar is coordinated nationally by Interfaith Worker Justice, and locally by the Faith Committee of St. Louis Area Jobs with Justice. Congregation Shaare Emeth and Central Reform Congregation are participating in the program, and the St. Louis group Jews United for Justice are one of the program’s sponsors.

“The Labor in the Pulpits project is to get the word out from the religious leadership of the importance of caring for the less fortunate, specifically in this case, the workers of the community,” said Rhona Lyons, a member of the steering committee for Jews United for Justice.

“Workers’ rights are an integral part of all three religions,” Lyons said. “The Torah has these wonderful quotes throughout about the need for employers to pay fair and prompt wages…and about the need to protect and take care of workers and make sure that those who are providing the labor get enough to sustain themselves.”

“There’s nothing in the Torah, the Bible or Koran that says you should cheat your employees. But people need to be reminded that it specifically says you should not cheat your employees,” Lyons said.

She said that worker rights are a major interest of JUJ, whose purpose is “to be a progressive voice in the Jewish community and a Jewish voice in the progressive community.”

Rabbi Andrea Goldstein, associate rabbi at Shaare Emeth, and alos a member of the JUJ steering committee, said Judaism is clear about the obligations of both workers and employers.

“The worker has to put in his or her fair day of work and can’t cheat the employer, but in return the employer cannot withhold wages or cheat the employee,” she said.

“There are these beautiful texts that say if someone works for you, that you are not allowed to withhold his earnings. The rabbis say that’s because this person is depending on that money for the basic necessities in his life and in the life of his family. And, if you withhold from him, you withhold life from him, in some ways,” Rabbi Goldstein said.

Rabbi Goldstein said she learned from her grandfather and her father, who immigrated to the United States after World War II. “My dad was instilled with how important the labor movement is for working people and how important it is for workers to be able to come together and have one voice, and have some sort of power in the working relationship.”

“I just feel that if a person is willing to put in a hard day’s work, that they should really be rewarded adequately, and not be taken advantage of,” she said.

Rabbi Goldstein said she would like to see the Jewish community as a whole have the same level of involvement in labor activism that it once did. “I want to be a voice that helps remind us of what we were and that we always need to be a voice for working men and women,” she said. “I do want people to more and more try to reclaim this as part of their ethical behavior, because it stems from our religious teachings as a people.”

She said at Shaare Emeth, she will prepare a brief sermon on this year’s theme for Labor in the Pulpit, immigrant worker rights, and additional information on worker rights issues will be available.

Kristina Molnar, with Jobs for Justice, said the Labor in the Pulpits program began in Chicago in 1996, and Jobs for Justice started the program in St. Louis for the first time last year.

“Labor rights and economic justice have always been a huge part of the faith community, both in St. Louis and across the country,” Molnar said.

“We asked different faith traditions from around the area and different congregations to talk about issues affecting workers over Labor Day,” she said. “And we’ve had an overwhelming response from congregations all over the state.”

For more information about the Labor in the Pulpits/On the Bimah/In the Minbar, visit www.stl-jwj.org.