Donald K. Wilson PhD

19 Grey Birch Court

Wakefield Rhode Island 02879

Supporting Narrative Resume -THE “FACE” OF MODERNITY-THE PROFESSIONAL EXPERT

In my view the most overwhelming crisis facing the Church today is its total irrelevance to modern life. The Church is largely bypassed and ignored. As an instance, the teachings of Humanae Vitae on our contracepting culture are whollly ignored by non-catholics and by roughly 90% of so-called “practicing” Catholics.

I would also assert that the central preoccupation of modernity is work; today’s individual is most concerned with his “career’.as suggested by the title of a recent book “My Job, Myself”. I might amend that title to say “My Job, My Career, My Choice, Myself” for it is the expression of one’s self by way of the free “choice” of work and career that defines todays individualistic culture.

This transformation of work from toil to fullfillment largely began with the Protestant Reformation and Calvin and Luther’s views that all work reflected God’s call and that man shared with God in this call. Ancient man saw work as God’s choice, alone, for us. The Counter-Reformation by the Church addressed many of the other divisions that led to the Reformation but it did not seriously contend with the emerging centrality of work.

In more recent times, work is giving way to the ideal of a profession that fullfills the ongoing direction of a career and thus completes and fullfills the childhood and collegiate vocational catechesis that characterizes todays educational structures. Thus, nearly everyone today sees their work to be that of a middle class professional.

Again, the Church has largely ignored this enormous change in our view of work. In modernity, man no longer shares his vocation with God, it is man’s choice alone. The Protestant Work Ethic now becomes the Professional Work Ethic. I further assert, that the irrelevance of the Church to Modernity results from the Church’s failure to address this wholesale transformation of work. This may have been a part of Pope John XXIV “Aggiornomento” agenda, however it certainly did not affect the content of the Vatican II writings.

To summarize my view, Modernity is dominantly about Work; in Modernity, Work replaces Worship. Karl Barth in his Church Dogmatics (1951) may have said this best;

“It is true; in human work....an apparently self-sufficient cosmos is constructed out of human ability, enterprise and achievement, goods and valuables, as the goal of all prior work and the prerequisite for all future human work. It lies at hand that this human edifice, like a canopy, obscures the true cosmos beyond...indeed screening out even God, leaving people with the deception that they behold God, whom they are to serve, in the culture which they have created and which has taken on an apparent life of its own.”

Sociologists and cultural anthropologists are rediscovering much of the early studies on work, such as that of Emile Durkheim, that identify a social solidarity, now called “social capital” that is central to the workplace and should be central to an expanded theology of work. Presumably the faith and trust that is shared within any religious community is but another form of this same “social capital” and yet our modern Catholic Theologians are not taking up these issues and new perspectives. Despite the fact that both the time and our understanding are ripe, the Church is still failing to build essential bridges to our “Workaholic Culture”.

Thus, Starting with the “Protestant Work Ethic”, and now in modernity with its “Professional Work Ethic”, there has been a growing gap between Church teachings and the reality of everyday life, that causes the Church to be irrelevant. As an example, work in modernity is highly ecumenical; collaborative work almost totally ignores sectarian differences. Yet the power of work as a universal ecumenical force, manifested in the industrial revolution has been largely ignored. The growth and nature of professionalism is hardly noted despite the fact that the hierarchy of the Church, itself, is today highly professionalized. I would suggest that many of our priests and bishops are firstly professionals who also happen to be Catholic.

I suggest, therefore, that you consider adding a Panel to your Conference with an emphasis entirely on Work, on the need for a comprehensive Theology of Work, for a rethinking of the excessive emphasis in education on vocationalism and professionalism, and for an examination of the professionalization of all work.

THE “FACE” OF MODERNITY-THE PROFESSIONAL EXPERT

Modernity can be characterized by five primary attributes 1) advanced and highly diversified technologies, 2) large task-oriented complex systems and organizations, 3) profligate mass media and propaganda, 4) an uprooted, highly mobile society bereft of natural groupings, and 5) a vast panoply of professional expertise. Of these, it is the role of the professional experts to intercede between the lay individual and the other attributes of modernity. In effect it is the professional who imparts a human, trustworthy “Face” to the sophistication and ever-changing nature of modernity.

Modern-day professions represent a radical change in our view of work. Before the Protestant Reformation work was largely viewed as God's creation, be it ennobling or degrading. With the Reformation, and the development of the Protestant Work Ethic, work became a calling, with God and man sharing in its co-creation. In modernity, work becomes central to our lives, our careers. As such, work expresses our individual choices and identities. Adapting the title of a recent book we might say “My Job, My Career, My Choice, My Life”. In modernity, work as an expression of man's freedom, becomes his choice alone; God is no longer relevant.

The modern-day professional is no longer restricted to the classical scholarly roles of doctor, lawyer, cleric or engineer. Today's professionals include sports stars who studied under coaches not professors, and craftsmen, e.g. plumbers, carpenters, and secretaries who learned, from experience, as apprentices and journeymen under masters rather than teachers. The important attributes of professionalism are commitments to excellence, to a career based on continuing development of personal skills and understanding, to trustworthiness, and to personal autonomy.

A. N. Whitehead, though acknowledging the training of professionals to be a profound discovery of modernity, cautioned that it “produces minds in a groove (of abstractions) -inadequate for the comprehension of human life. Though people have lives outside their professions, the point is the restraint of serious thought within a groove. The remainder of life is treated superficially, with the imperfect categories of thought derived from one's profession.” Life becomes largely defined by one's work, one's profession.

Yet, despite these limitations, modernity, organized around professionals, proves to be enormously effective in satisfying most of our physical needs. I suggest that this is so because we largely trust our professionals, despite their shortcomings (W. Moore noted that for professionals it is ”let the buyer trust”, rather than “let the buyer beware”). And, by-and-large, that trust has not been betrayed. Hence the view that professionals provide the “Face” of modernity. And thus, in our richly professionalized culture, there is a huge social capital of expertise upon which to draw.

The Education/Profession Vocational Engine (Circa 1870-1970/USA).

However, this paper is not just focused upon the emergence of professionalism as the new dominant mode of work, it is equally focused upon the ways modern education has been warped so as to be closely linked, e.g. as a vocational appendage, to this new view of work. (I use the word vocation here to signify its modern usage, driven by work, rather than its older usage, calling, i.e. driven by God).

The linking of education to work and most especially to professional work has occurred most effectively in the US in the century following the end of the Civil War. The coupling of education to work was primarily led by the transformation of American Universities into vocational Multiversities. These, in turn, have influenced secondary and primary school curricula and teaching to promote similar kinds of vocational and career orientations. The whole educational structure acts as a first-stage launch platform for eventual professional careers. Diplomas have now become the passports to good jobs. (see Burton J. Bledstein "The Culture of Professionalism"). Overall, I refer to this transformation of work and education as the Second Reformation for it is therein that work replaces worship.

The classical curricula of self-understanding, understanding others, understanding God, of virtue, soul and salvation have all been abandoned by the academy in their search to be relevant to modernity, along with its technological, mobility and systems needs (See James Tunstead Burtchaell “The Dying of the Light-The Disengagement of Colleges & Universities from their Christian Churches”). This vocational engine, shorn of ancient wisdom, is the great endowment of Modernity to the beginning of the third millennium.

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