If members of the Kansas government feel the need for spiritual solace
Rob Boston at Americans United reports on theocracy in Kansas.
Suppose you have a job at a private company. Suppose some of your colleagues do a bible study thing in their lunch hour. You and your friends have a secular sandwich together and all’s well. (Unless the bible studiers are hogging the break room.)
But then suppose it’s the boss who suggested the bible study, and the boss attends regularly. Hmm. Could the boss be using attendance as points toward promotions and raises? All’s not entirely well then.
Now suppose it’s not a private company, but a government office. Major problem.
A scenario like this is playing out in Kansas, a state that has been experimenting with a sort of de facto“faith-based” government under Republican Gov. Sam Brownback. Courtney Canfield, a business-filing specialist at the Secretary of State’s Office, says she was fired in 2013 because she declined to attend a Christian service that was heavily promoted by Assistant Secretary of State Eric Rucker.
Canfield’s complaint alleges that the Secretary of State’s Office routinely invited employees to attend services conducted by Dave DePue, a minister who acts as a sort of “unofficial pastor” to Kansas lawmakers and officials, reported the Wichita Eagle.
See, that’s not cool, even without the firing. That’s embarrassingly theocratic.
“These invitations were distributed during normal business hours and included a ‘prayer guide’ to be utilized at that week’s service,” Canfield’s lawsuit reads. “Despite the repeated invitations, Plaintiff never attended such a service. While Plaintiff was a Methodist, she did not regularly attend church services or otherwise practice any particular religious beliefs in any way.”
And you know what? That’s none of her boss’s business. Her boss has state power, therefore he has no business pushing anyone to attend “services” of any kind.
All of this could have been avoided if officials in Kansas spent more time doing their jobs and less time worrying about the spiritual lives of their employees.
A good first step would be to send that “unofficial” chaplain packing. The capital of Kansas is Topeka, and the city and its surrounding metropolitan area have a population of about 234,000. There appears to be no shortage of houses of worship there.
If members of the Kansas government feel the need for spiritual solace, let them avail themselves of one of those.
If they can’t stand to work for eight or nine hours without refreshing church services mixed in, they should get jobs in those houses of worship instead of the state government.
Here’s another scenario: Suppose you are working for the state government as an intern in a job you would really like to be made permanent? Suppose the job is in your field, that you have an advanced degree, and that you get to spend hours outside on a boat as part of your job (because you work in Clean Lakes)? Suppose during field work, you stop for lunch with your boss and he bows his head, grabs your hand, and begins to say grace? Suppose you are expected to join in?
This is why religion and government are a bad mix. In the end, to avoid severe repercussions, I felt compelled to tell my boss and others that I was a deist. At least they didn’t know what that was, and it sounded all religiousy. But in the end, it didn’t work out, because they didn’t hire women as permanent members of their staff, no matter whether said woman was religious, atheist, or apathetic.
Oyyyy…that’s depressing on so many counts. I’m sorry.
If they were a private employer, it would be illegal. Since they are government, it is Unconstitutional. Frankly, I think some people need to be impeached over this.
This sort of thing is probably more common than we realize. Back in 1984, I was interviewing for a job in the Oklahoma State government (I was already working there, I was just looking to move up a bit). The interviewer leaned over, lowered his voice, said he knew he wasn’t allowed to ask me, but he wanted to know if I prayed. You see, they have a bible study at lunch every day. I must have given the wrong answer, or he could tell from the look on my face and the fact that I stammered quite a bit, because I didn’t get the job. I did discover that the “voluntary” Bible study was “voluntary” in name only. As he told me, everybody in the office joined in.
Years later, I realized how lucky I was not to have gotten that job. And I realized how commonplace religion in the workplace is. I’ve encountered it in nearly every workplace I’ve been, the only exception being McDonald’s, where I worked for about a year when I was in college. They didn’t want to take time to pray. They wanted you to move your ass and forget about God; Ronald McDonald was your only god while you were at work.