For those seeking work

For the search, the interviews and the waiting.

Unemployment is not only a financial problem. It attacks a person’s sense of usefulness, which is why it hurts far past the bank balance. This prayer is for the search — including the long stretch in the middle where nothing happens.

The Prayer

Lord, You worked with Your hands in a small town for most of Your life,
and no one thought it remarkable.

I need work. Not only money, though I need that too —
I need something to do that is worth doing.

Open a door. Show me where to look.
Give me the words in the interview,
and the humility to accept work that is beneath what I once had.

Keep me from bitterness toward those who have what I want,
and from despair on the days when no one replies.

St. Joseph the Worker, pray for me. Amen.

For Someone Who Has Lost a Job

Lord, this was not their fault, and it has taken more than a salary.
Restore what they have lost: not only the income,
but the confidence and the standing.
And let those of us who love them be useful
rather than merely sympathetic. Amen.

About This Prayer

St. Joseph the Worker is the patron of workers and job seekers; his feast is 1 May. St. Cajetan is invoked for employment in Italy, Spain and Latin America, where his shrines are crowded with people carrying CVs. Both patronages exist because unemployment has always been a spiritual emergency, not merely an economic one.