The union's battle with Case Farms has drawn mixed reactions in a town dotted with furniture and textile factories. Morganton has never been a hotbed of labor activism. Other than the chicken plant, there's only one unionized company in Burke County. St. Charles has served as a refuge for the Guatamalans and other Latino workers, who are predominantly Catholic. The workers used the church as a strike headquarters during the work stoppages, holding meetings in the sanctuary and serving meals in the kitchen.
Union organizers continue to borrow office space from the church.
It is a new role for the parish, which was never involved in labor issues and was largely unprepared for the surge of Latino Catholics. The priest, Father Ken Whittington, has learned just enough Spanish to say mass so that the Guatemalans can understand him. Protestant churches in Morganton have mostly steered clear of the labor dispute, but Whittington says that St. Charles had a moral duty to get involved because the workers were being mistreated. Many of them are illegal. They're sitting ducks in many, many ways.