Free Republic

Former BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee (BCBST) employee Tanja Benton has been awarded over $680,000 by a Tennessee federal jury following a verdict that the insurer failed to offer reasonable accommodation for her religious beliefs. The jury concluded that BCBST “did not prove by a preponderance of the evidence either that it had offered a reasonable accommodation to Plaintiff or that it could not reasonably accommodate the Plaintiff’s religious beliefs without undue hardship.” The total damages awarded to Benton amounted to $687,240, which included $177,240 in back pay, $10,000 in compensatory damages, and $500,000 in punitive damages. In a related case,...

District actively promoted non-religious groups, including a Pride Club and Green Team... A school district that just weeks ago had refused students permission to begin an interfaith prayer club – even though a wide range of other special interest organizations like a Pride club and a Green club were approved – abruptly has reversed itself. "We are very pleased that the Issaquah School District is allowing our clients to start a prayer club at their school this spring," explained Kayla Toney, associate counsel at First Liberty Institute,.. "Schools should always respect the religious beliefs of their students. This is a...

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito raised concerns on Tuesday about potential jurors who hold “traditional religious beliefs” on homosexuality being labeled as “bigots,” according to a statement attached to an orders list. The Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to weigh a case about whether potential jurors can be excluded based on their sincere religious beliefs. The case surrounded a lawsuit by Jean Finney, who is lesbian, against her former employer, the Missouri Department of Corrections, for workplace discrimination due to her sexuality. Alito, one of the high court’s six Republican-appointed justices, issued a statement toward the bottom of Tuesday’s orders...

Fox Sports reporter Allison Williams is one of two former ESPN employees suing the Worldwide Leader over their termination for refusing to comply with the company’s COVID-19 vaccination mandate. Williams and former producer Beth Faber filed a joint lawsuit on Wednesday, claiming ESPN and Disney violated their religious beliefs. In the 83-page complaint, filed in Connecticut, Williams claims she applied for an “exemption from vaccination on grounds of disability” as she was set to undergo in vitro fertilization. She later applied for a religious exemption, which was denied and led to her exit from the company in October 2021.

Whether or not a religious belief is sincerely held by an applicant or employee is rarely at issue in most religious discrimination lawsuits. With both the EEOC and DFEH guidance requiring employers to accommodate an employee who has a sincerely held religious belief that prevents an employee from receiving any of the COVID-19 vaccinations, the issue of what is a “sincerely held religious belief” has become more important in employment law. This is particularly true for those employers that decide to mandate the COVID-19 vaccination as a condition of employment or condition of receiving certain employment benefits.

Theologians and ministers may want to think about results of a survey of 275 college students about their theological beliefs.In the open-access journal PLoS One, Andrew Shtulman and Max Rattner published their findings from a survey 275 students at Occidental College last spring. The participants, taken from an introductory psychology course, responded to questionnaires on a matter of theological subjects. Here is the abstract of their paper, “Theories of God: Explanatory coherence in religious cognition.” Representations of God in art, literature, and discourse range from the highly anthropomorphic to the highly abstract. The present study explored whether people who...

Colorado cake artist Jack Phillips, owner of the Masterpiece Cakeshop (Screenshot) (CNSNews.com) – A federal district court ruled Friday that Colorado cannot block an attempt by Colorado cake artist Jack Phillips to sue the state over its “hostility” towards him and his Christian beliefs. Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) represents Phillips, owner of the Masterpiece Cakeshop, in the lawsuit. As CNSNews.com previously reported , the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, in June 2018, saying the commission “violated the Free Exercise Clause” by requiring Phillips to go against his religious beliefs about gay marriage...

How can the administration stand up for the religious rights of Muslims while persecuting Christians for their religious beliefs? Obviously, Obama and Democrats have become the pot calling the kettle black! A Federal judge, James E. Shadid, a nominee of the Obama administration and the only Arab Federal judge in Illinois, was lucky enough to draw a case involving religious discrimination against Muslims. Two Muslim drivers, hired by Star Transport, were fired for refusing to transport alcohol as part of their job, and as a result were fired. They then sued the company for religious discrimination, supported by the EEOC...

David Gibson suggested this might be Hillary Clinton’s “clinging to guns and religion” moment, and he may be right — assuming she survives the corruption scandals in the first place. Last night, Hillary told the Women in the World Summit that the path to Abortion Nirvana will only open up by changing religion, culture, and values to accommodate it:CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO “Far too many women are denied access to reproductive health care and safe childbirth, and laws don’t count for much if they’re not enforced. Rights have to exist in practice — not just on paper,”...

I have been pondering the question posed in the title of this post for quite some time. I believe the main source of this pondering is the furor that is ongoing in America over the rights of individual business owners, who happen to be Christians and hold certain religious values, to refuse to service certain segments of our population. I was informed last year in a discussion on this blog that these Christian business owners had no such right, that if they did not want to serve a certain group of people, that constituted discrimination, and they should shut their...

Americans celebrate their independence today in a very different society from the one born in 1776. The beliefs the Founders held most dear, and upon which they built a uniquely free society, are largely alien -- even objectionable -- in today's America. I am not referring to the changes brought about by President Obama, but to a deeper change that preceded Obama and which fueled his ascendancy. The principles of freedom upon which America was built -- such as the ideas that all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights -- arose from...

TIFTON — Sonny’s Real Pit Bar-B-Q on U.S. Highway 82 West is now The Smokehouse Restaurant because local franchise owner Bill Davis refused to sell beer, wine or liquor in the “family restaurant.” Also, the Sonny’s corporation didn’t believe it was appropriate for employees there to wear “I Pledge...I Pray” T-shirts at work.

S. T. Karnick, who writes about culture from a right of center perspective for numerous publications, says that the TV show CSI: Crime Scene Investigation has decided to depict two of its characters as openly Christian. Karnick writes about last night's episode of CSI on his blog, Karnick on Culture (http://stkarnick.com): Religion is all over the place on network TV series now. Many programs just can't seem to resist bringing it up, and the treatments are typically fairly sympathetic though by no means without nuance or sophistication. For example: following up on last week's interesting comment at the end of...

By Nigel Bunyan "A couple's plans for a £5,000 wedding at Alton Towers were thrown into confusion yesterday after it emerged that the theme park had double booked them with a fun day for 20,000 Muslims." Amanda Morris, 30, and her fiance, Scott Lee, 31, have been told that if they go ahead with the ceremony they will not be allowed to go on celebratory rides together. Furthermore, Miss Morris and her female guests will have to cover up to be in line with guests of Islamic Leisure wearing hijabs...." "Believing that they and their own guests had the complex...

Although I am interested in exemptions made for people of all faiths, I am particularly interested in exemptions that have been made for non-Christians.