I Thought the Company Was a Covenant

My grandfather worked for a particular railroad from the time he graduated college until he retired. His entire career was spent at that one company. My father worked for a particular petroleum company from the time he graduated college until he retired. His entire career was spent at that one company. From watching the way this worked for both of them, I concluded that this is how a person should live. This was not pushed on me. It was not something they harped on or even spoke about, really. I just observed the pattern and then conformed my beliefs and my values around those observations.

In college I worked hard to make good grades and graduated at the top of my class, all because I was focused on being accepted by the company of my choice. The whole way through school I wanted to do everything I could to earn a spot there. I assumed that once I did that, I would join the rest of my life to that company. I made a ton of assumptions that were not quite right. I assumed the company would be as interested in keeping employees employed as I was interested in making the company successful.

I worked crazy, stupid long hours. Eighty to ninety hours a week was very common early in my career. I mean physically in the office, eighty to ninety hours. One ridiculous time, the building shut down for a long weekend. I brought home a large UNIX workstation so I could work from Friday morning all through the night, all through Saturday, all through Saturday night, all through Sunday, all through Sunday night, and then most of Monday.

There was no balance. It was all because I really thought the job was about making sure the company was successful so the company would make sure the employees could stay and thrive. Then things happened that I could not square with my beliefs about how the world was supposed to operate. People were laid off. Divisions closed. People lost their jobs. It took a long time, but I eventually realized the world worked very differently than I had assumed.

It was wrong of me to assume there was a covenantal bond between me and my employer. A covenant is something I understand better now as a Catholic, and covenantal bonds were very much a part of Israel’s life in the Old Testament. A covenant is mutual self-giving, and it is permanent. It does not end. I tried to make employment that kind of structure. I would give myself to the company, and I expected the company to reciprocate indefinitely. We were united for my entire career. Instead, the company and I had entered a contract. I give you this, you give me that, for as long as we both want to. Once one of us is done, it is over. No hard feelings. That is the contract I signed. That is the relationship I actually entered.

In John chapter 1, in the story of John the Baptist pointing to Jesus, he says, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.” Most of us hear those words differently than the first people who heard them. Every year Israel remembered the exit from slavery in Egypt with Passover. In the temple, as part of that feast, a great number of lambs were sacrificed. The blood of the lamb was sprinkled for the forgiveness of sin. A river ran through and under the temple to keep the place workable. Out of the side of the temple, during that sacrifice, flowed blood and water.

Later in John, he makes a point of saying that blood and water flowed from the side of Jesus as he was sacrificed, like a lamb, on the Cross. The timing matters. As Jesus died, and blood and water flowed from his side, the temple sacrifice was happening, and blood and water were flowing from the temple’s side. That connects Jesus to Passover, to the lamb, and to the taking away of sin. “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.”

This is also wrapped up in the new covenant Jesus institutes at the Last Supper. We do not have a contract with him. It is not “I will call you Lord, and then you forgive my sins.” God gives himself to us completely, and we give ourselves to God completely. It is an eternal relationship. It is not like a contract.

At Mass the Church even talks about joining our sacrifice to his — the things that hurt, the things that are not fair, the tragic and the sad. In a covenant those things can be brought and offered. They take on a different meaning than they had when they were only a private loss. A contract has no place for that. A contract is finished when one party is done.

People will observe patterns around them and set their understanding of the world by what they saw. I did that with a railroad and a petroleum company. To understand God, we have to understand covenant, not only contract. You matter in a way a firm never signed. Your suffering matters in a way a layoff does not measure.

If you are still giving a job the vow it never signed, start by saying the true name of the relationship. Contract. Not family. Not marriage. Not “they will take care of me because I took care of them.” Write down what the firm actually promised — pay, a role, a season — and what you have been secretly adding. The added line is usually some version of forever. Forever was never in the packet.

Honest labor can stay. You can still do the work well. You do not have to become cynical to stop marrying the company. What has to change is the vow. This week, pick one extra that exists only because you think loyalty will be repaid in kind. The Sunday night at the workstation. The vacation you do not take. The dinner you miss so a project can look loved. Put that extra down once and see whether the building notices. Often it does not. You were maintaining a covenant by yourself.

When a layoff or a closed division shows up, the pain is real. Do not add a second injury by calling it betrayal of a vow that was never made. Grieve the job. Grieve the pattern you inherited from watching good men stay put. Then look at the people who actually live in a covenant with you — spouse, children, the God who does not expire the relationship when a plant closes. Put the next hour there.

If you are a parent, notice what your children are concluding from watching you. Nobody has to preach a rule for a child to learn one. I was not told to marry a firm. I watched. If what they see is a person who cannot leave the building, they will call that love. You can still work hard and let them see a door that opens toward home.

This is a pastoral reflection, not clinical care and not a substitute for it. If you or someone you love is in immediate danger, call 988 or local emergency services.

Drawn from a homily first preached in 2023.