(RNS) — In siding with an evangelical Christian mail carrier who quit the U.S. Postal Service after he was forced to deliver packages on Sundays, his Sabbath, the Supreme Court on Thursday (June 29) did something rare: It brought a whole panoply of U.S. religions together.The unanimous ruling in Groff v. DeJoy clarified that employers must do more than the minimum to accommodate workers’ requests related to religious observance.
The ruling mostly vindicates Gerald Groff, a former mail carrier from Pennsylvania, who sued the post office, saying the requirement that he work on Sundays violated his deeply held belief that Sunday was his day of rest. (U.S. mail is not usually delivered Sundays, but in 2013, the USPS signed a contract with Amazon to deliver the company’s packages, including on Sundays.)
Groff was represented by First Liberty Institute, the conservative Christian legal powerhouse based in Plano, Texas.
But in ruling in favor of the Christian mail carrier, the court also united a host of non-Christian religions in the U.S., who saw the decision written by Justice Samuel Alito as a much needed corrective to the challenges they face in balancing their work with their sincerely held religious practices.
Whether it’s accommodating Sikh health care workers who are required by their faith not to shave their beards or Jewish teachers who want to take time off f …
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The ruling mostly vindicates Gerald Groff, a former mail carrier from Pennsylvania, who sued the post office, saying the requirement that he work on Sundays violated his deeply held belief that Sunday was his day of rest. (U.S. mail is not usually delivered Sundays, but in 2013, the USPS signed a contract with Amazon to deliver the company’s packages, including on Sundays.)
Groff was represented by First Liberty Institute, the conservative Christian legal powerhouse based in Plano, Texas.
But in ruling in favor of the Christian mail carrier, the court also united a host of non-Christian religions in the U.S., who saw the decision written by Justice Samuel Alito as a much needed corrective to the challenges they face in balancing their work with their sincerely held religious practices.
Whether it’s accommodating Sikh health care workers who are required by their faith not to shave their beards or Jewish teachers who want to take time off f …nnDiscussion:nn” ai_name=”RocketNews AI: ” start_sentence=”Can I tell you more about this article?” text_input_placeholder=”Type ‘Yes'”]