Gilbert Meilaender on work

By undergirding the dignity of irksome work in powerful religious language, we may too easily be invited to overlook just how hard and unsatisfying much toil is. We may recommend such work as service to the neighbor or, even, as spiritual discipline, but we should be careful lest this religious language lead us to ignore the empirical realities of the work many people do.

from Working: Its Meaning and Its Limits (Ethics of Everyday Life), (U of Notre Dame, 2000)