Religion in the Workplace: Employer’s Refusal to Permit Employee to Attend Jehovah’s Witness Convention Leads to Liability

In a new California appeals court decision, an employer learned the hard way about the obligation to accommodate an employee’s religious beliefs and practices—even if they conflict with work obligations.

Request to Attend Religious Convention

Lester Young, a Jehovah’s Witness, worked for Gemini Aluminum Corp. in Pomona. Young had attended a church convention almost every year since 1970 because it is considered a form of worship and religious study in his faith.

After working at Gemini for 15 months, Young asked his supervisor, Jack Kaufman, for up to two days off to go to the convention. Gemini’s management committee, of which Kaufman was a member, denied the request.

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Employee Protests Leave Denial

When Kaufman told Young the request was denied, Young explained his beliefs and why he needed to attend the convention. He then told Kaufman that he was going to the convention anyway, and he did so, missing one day of work on a Friday.

When Young returned to work on Monday, Kaufman said he was being suspended for 10 days for not showing up for work. Young protested, stating that he felt obligated to attend the convention for religious reasons and that others had received lesser discipline for more absences. He then told Kaufman he was going to the “labor board.” Kaufman reported this conversation to the committee, and a few days later, Young was fired.

Young filed a religious discrimination complaint with the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing. Gemini denied the charges, arguing that attending the convention wasn’t a religious requirement and that Young was suspended and terminated for insubordination and failure to follow the company policy requiring documentation to be submitted with leave requests. But the department found for Young, and now an appellate court has upheld the decision.

Failure to Accommodate

The court explained the general rule that an employer must accommodate an employee’s religious beliefs and observances that conflict with an employment requirement, if it’s reasonably possible for the employer to do so without undue hardship.

Attending the convention amounted to a religious observance, as Young believed it was his duty to attend and he and his family had regularly gone in the past. However, Gemini made no attempt to accommodate Young, but instead outright denied the request. Moreover, Gemini did not assert that accommodating Young would have caused hardship.

The court rejected Gemini’s argument that Young’s failure to follow company documentation procedures for leave requests was a legitimate basis for taking adverse action against him. The company’s policy was vague, enforced inconsistently, and not communicated to Young. What’s more, Young’s disobedience was triggered by Gemini’s initial failure to accommodate. An employer, said the court, can’t justify terminating an employee for perceived disobedience triggered by the employer’s own violation of the antibias laws.

No Steps to Prevent Discrimination

Finally, the court faulted Gemini for not taking all reasonable steps to prevent discrimination, as California antibias law requires. Reasonable steps may include establishing antidiscrimination policies and procedures as well as promptly investigating discrimination claims to prevent further occurrences, all of which Gemini didn’t do.

How to Avoid Problems

Here are some tips for how you can prevent a similar lawsuit:

 

1. Offer accommodation. Once an employee informs you of a conflict between job requirements and religious beliefs or observances, you must consider and offer possible accommodations. You don’t have to accept the employee’s proposal if another available option—such as taking the leave at a different time—would allow the person to satisfy religious obligations and minimize your inconvenience.

    

2. Don’t judge the sincerity of religious beliefs. Courts are usually reluctant to analyze what is a bona fide religion or religious belief or practice, and they don’t want you to do so either. Except in highly unusual situations, the safest course is to take the employee’s word that their religious practices really do conflict with their job obligations.

    

3. Don’t retaliate. One of Gemini’s biggest mistakes was terminating Young because he protested the failure to accommodate him.

    

4. Be consistent. When an employee has engaged in a protected activity, such as making an accommodation request, your failure to scrupulously follow company policy can lead to retaliation charges. For example, although Gemini asserted that Young didn’t follow documentation procedures for his leave request, a key factor weighing against Gemini was that any such policy was vague, not communicated to Young, and inconsistently enforced.