This holiday season, people of faith from around the country are asking themselves if Wal-Mart represents the moral values we hold most dear. Join WakeUpWalMart.com, Faith leaders, and congregations across the country in calling on Wal-Mart to change.
Lee ScottDear Mr. Scott,
For people of all faiths, now is a time to remember and embrace the best of our values. It is a time to reflect upon our lives, our families, and the solemn responsibility we all have to improve the world for those less fortunate than us.
In the Bible, the prophets teach us to "do what is just and right" (Jeremiah 22:3), to "seek justice" (Isaiah 1:17), "to act justly" (Micah 6:8), and to "let justice flow like a stream" (Amos: 5:22-24).
We must ask ourselves, can we look the other way when those with so much choose to do so little? Can we ignore exploitation and greed, when a few try to enrich themselves at the expense of the many? Sadly, these are the immoral values exemplified by one of America’s largest and richest corporations, Wal-Mart.
Despite $11.2 billion in profit, Wal-Mart leaves 775,000 employees with no company health care, leaves nearly 1 out of every 2 children of its employees either uninsured or on public health care, repeatedly broke child labor laws, and is being sued by 1.6 million female employees in the largest gender discrimination lawsuit in U.S. history.
Shockingly, despite these moral failings, Wal-Mart, in the last year, chose to adopt some of the most anti-family policies in American corporate history, including salary caps, a scheduling policy which makes it impossible for employees to have a normal life or spend regular time with their families, a punitive attendance policy that penalizes workers who need to take a day off to care for a sick child, and the elimination of low-deductible health care plans for new hires.
Wal-Mart’s values are not Christian values, nor do they reflect the values of any of our faiths. As people of faith, it is our duty, it is our moral obligation, to write to you and ask Wal-Mart to reverse its anti-family policies. Wal-Mart’s anti-family policies are immoral, unjust, and a direct affront to the teachings of our faith.
Mr. Scott, what Wal-Mart has done to families does not reflect our moral values, and it is shameful that a company as wealthy and as rich as Wal-Mart would choose to impart such suffering on its 1.39 million employees, many of whom make poverty-level wages and struggle to survive.
Therefore, for the faith community at large, we realize Wal-Mart’s values are not moral values and we must call upon Wal-Mart to change. We ask ourselves:
Would Jesus shop at Wal-Mart knowing how Wal-Mart treats hard-working families?
Would Abraham ignore the pain of those who must endure poverty wages and no health care?
Would Mohammad look the other way as Wal-Mart breaks child labor laws again and again?
Mr. Scott, we ask you, what would our spiritual leaders do?
The answer is simple. Our spiritual leaders would not embrace Wal-Mart’s values of greed and exploitation, particularly when hard-working families struggle to care for themselves and their children as a result of those misguided values.
Those of us who are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist or Hindu have scriptures that remind us that God is just and God’s servants must practice justice in all of our words and deeds. As we celebrate our own unique spiritual traditions, we also ask ourselves, would our God want us to support Wal-Mart’s values and actions with our dollars?
Mr. Scott, you have the power to change Wal-Mart, to end these terrible policies, and to set an example of how corporations can reflect our faith’s call for righteousness and justice. In the spirit of all of our faiths, we want to remind you that “From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from the one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded.” (Luke 12:48)
So beginning today, in the common ground of all of our faiths, we call on Wal-Mart to put families first, to change, to embrace the simple fact that ‘with great wealth comes great responsibility.’
In the end, it is our sincere ‘Hope for the Holidays’ that Wal-Mart will change for the better, do what is morally and ethically right, honor the teachings our faith leaders, and reflect the best of American values.
Sincerely,
