What to do if fired from your job for being a christian?

Answer 1

It depends on the circumstances, but in many countries you cannot be fired for your religious affiliation. That is not universal however.

It may also depend on what job you were doing.

In the United States, the rule is that no one can be discriminated against (which would include being singled out for firing) due to religious affiliation OR LACK THEREOF. If you feel that you have been fired due to your religion, you should file a complaint with either your state or the Federal Department of Labor (or similar government organization).

However, note that there are certain exceptions and assumptions to the above, which DO allow an employer to legally fire you for your religious views:

• Religions themselves are exempt from discriminating on the basis of religion - that is, working directly for a religious organization (one with the explicit IRS exemption of being a religious organization, NOT just a business owned by such an organization) means they can hire and fire based on religion.
• If the practice of your religious views creates an undue burden on the employer to accomodate. The bar is set quite high for this, meaning that the employer would have to show that accomodating your religious views and practices is well beyond something that they can reasonably be expected to do. For instance, if you belonged to some religion that required you to pray for 15 minutes every hour, the employer could reasonably argue that accomodating this is an undue burden on them. Or, say that 75% of their current workforce cannot work (due to religious duties) on a certain day. The employer would then be entirely within their rights to hire NEW employees with the stipulation that they would work on day X, regardless of their religious beliefs. Such new workers would then not be able to demand that they have day X off, as it was part of the original job and changing that would require an undue burden on the employer; such exceptions have to be explicit and agree-upon ahead of time.
• If you religious beliefs interfere with completion of the fundamental aspects of your job. For instance: say you were Muslim, and felt that handling pork products was unclean. If you worked at a Pig slaughterhouse, it would likely be impossible for the employer to reasonably keep you from handling pork, and could thus fire you.
• If the practice of your religious beliefs interferes with the practice of other's religious (or secular atheist) beliefs, and no reasonable accomodation can be made to resolve the issue. E.g. if your religion considers Red Hats sacreligious, and another person's requires wearing Red Hats, you cannot claim a religious exception to force that other person to stop wearing Red Hats.
• If the practice of your religious beliefs creates a "hostile workplace". This is tricky, but generally involves extreme displays of religion and active proselytizing

Generally, the last two boil down to the principle that the practice of your religion cannot infringe on another's freedom to practice of their religion (or, the choice to practice NO religion). If you do so, then that's a valid reason to fire you.

Note that an employer does not have to make any accomodation for religious group practices on company property - thus, they would NOT have to provide facilities for Bible study meetings of employees, but would have to provide places where an individual could pray undisturbed.