Pie in the sky

“A pie in the sky” means to search for the impossible dream, and was coined by a labor unionist. In the early 1900’s, the labor organizer Joe Hill was extremely critical of the church’s  treatment of slaves. He wrote a tune called ‘The Preacher and the Slave” accusing the clergy of making false promises of a better life in heaven while people starved on earth. The song goes: “Work and pray, live on hay. You’ll get pie in the sky when you die. That’s a lie!”