Employers, fearful of religious expression in the workplace, must be even more nervous after yesterday’s story about the forced (?) removal of a Lutheran chaplain from her post as executive officer at the Air Force Academy. Faye Fiore, in today’s L.A . Times writes about religious conflict focuses in the private sector.
”Pushed primarily by evangelical Christians, faith is finding a growing presence in corporations that for years have been resistant to religious expression, including such giants as AOL Inc., Intel Corp., American Express Co., American Airlines Inc. and Ford Motor Co.
But it is an uneasy, risk-prone experiment. An evangelical movement emboldened by its strength in the 2004 presidential election, and pressing hard to advance its agenda in the battles over abortion and same-sex marriage, is finding that it must accept limits to secure a place in the corporate world.”
Employers, fearing lawsuits, understand law number ten from Norman Augustine’s book,:
“10. Bulls do not win bull fights; people do. People do not win people fights; lawyers do.” The very topic of religion in the workplace scares Human Resources officers.It raises questions of freedom of expression, discrimination, diversity and all those other issues that keep lawyers busy and interfere with getting the job done.
Good etiquette can smooth out conflicts, avoid lawsuits and the onerous task of writing company regulations.
Spero News just published my piece on the controversy over limits to witnessing by Evangelical Christians at the Air Force Academy. I suggested a rationale for ettiquette of workplace spirituality.
The etiquette of workplace spirituality can be based on a these principles:
• Our employer is provided a service to the community. Our spirituality should reinforce – or at least not interfere with - that service. (If this statement is false, if our employer is not providing a service we need to either leave or dedicate ourselves to changing the business.)
• We can and should be clear about our own beliefs, acting in Lincoln’s words, with “firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right”. A humble and forthright witness will help others to see their own paths.
• We need to be mindful that God has not given us the power to see the right with absolute clarity. If the other person sees the right differently, we need to act with respect, trusting that “God will make the matter clear”. (Phil. 3:15)
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