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Summary
- Short prayers follow a job search step by step: starting to look, changing jobs, an interview, waiting, rejection, money running out, choosing between offers and the first day, with one for a son or daughter looking for work.
- Traditional prayers for work are quoted from the 1928 Book of Common Prayer (“Direct us, O Lord” and “For Every Man in his Work”) and a prayer to Saint Joseph indulgenced by Pope Pius X in 1906.
- Pope Pius XII instituted the feast of Saint Joseph the Worker on 1 May 1955.
- Argentine Catholics ask San Cayetano for bread and work on 7 August; Russian Orthodox believers ask Saint Spyridon of Trimythous, a former shepherd, for help finding work. Most Protestants pray to God alone.
- No prayer promises a job within a set number of days; Jesus warned against “vain repetitions” (Matthew 6:7) and told his disciples to ask, seek and knock (Matthew 7:7).
- Ruth gleaning in Boaz’s field (Ruth 2) and Joseph in Egypt (Genesis 39) are two Bible stories of looking for work and prospering in it.
Bibliography (Click to show)
- Scripture quotations are from the King James Version (1611), text of Project Gutenberg eBook no. 10 (Genesis 39:2–3; Joshua 1:9; Ruth 2:2–3; Psalm 37:5, 7; 90:17; Proverbs 3:5–6; 16:3; Matthew 6:7–8, 33; 7:7; 13:55; 2 Corinthians 4:8; Galatians 6:9; Philippians 4:19; Colossians 3:23; James 1:5). https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10
- The Book of Common Prayer (Protestant Episcopal Church in the U.S.A.), Standard Book of 1928. Prayers and Thanksgivings, “For Every Man in his Work,” p. 44; Prayers, Collects, “Direct us, O Lord, in all our doings,” p. 49. PDF facsimile: https://www.artisticdailyprayers.org/uploads/3/0/1/6/30164961/bcp1928std.pdf
- Lasance, Francis Xavier. The Blessed Sacrament Book. New York: Benziger Brothers, 1913. “Prayer to St. Joseph for All Those Who Are Devoted to Labor,” p. 55. https://archive.org/details/BlessedSacramentBook
- Apostolic Penitentiary. Decree on the granting of special indulgences for the Year of Saint Joseph, 8 December 2020 (on Pius XII’s institution of the feast of Saint Joseph the Worker, 1 May 1955). https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/tribunals/apost_penit/documents/rc_trib_appen_pro_20201208_decreto-indulgenze-sangiuseppe_en.html
- “St. Cajetan.” The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 3. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1908. https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03145a.htm
- Buenos Aires Herald. “August 7: a day for gamblers, workers, and the unemployed,” 7 August 2023. https://buenosairesherald.com/culture-ideas/august-7-a-day-for-the-gamblers-workers-and-the-unemployed
- St. Spyridon Greek Orthodox Church (Weirton, W.Va.), Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. “About Saint Spyridon.” https://www.stspyridon.wv.goarch.org/patron-saint/
- Kozintseva, Yulia. “Молитвы Спиридону Тримифунтскому” (Prayers to Spyridon of Trimythous). Lenta.ru, 11 January 2024. https://lenta.ru/articles/2024/01/11/molitvy-spiridonu-trimifuntskomu/
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