Librarian sues library for making her work on Sundays

I remember when I was a librarian that everyone except me hated working Sundays. But that's not what this lawsuit is about - a librarian is suing a library because of her religious beliefs:

The library has apparently decided to require an employee to violate her conscience,” said Kevin Theriot, an attorney with the Kansas City office of the Alliance Defense Fund. “We intend to make sure that this discrimination against her based upon her religious beliefs is corrected.”

ADF and the Christian Law Association filed the case, Constance J. Rehm v. Rolling Hills Consolidated Library and Patricia Lamb, in the United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri, St. Joseph Division.

The Rolling Hills Consolidated Library fired librarian Connie Rehm for insubordination shortly after she filed her request to no longer be scheduled to work on Sundays because of her religious beliefs. Library officials claim they made an attempt to accommodate Rehm by allowing a part-time employee to volunteer to work for her on Sundays, in return for her working on Saturdays.

Library to librarian: Thou shalt work on Sunday, ADF Media Relations, 2004-08-06

If anyone has any updates on this case, let me know.

5/12/06 update - jury rules for librarian

Comments

[PRNewsWire]

Librarian Sues Bank and Phone Company over Security Breach
MIAMI, Florida — January 3, 2007 — Librarian Theodore Karantsalis filed a lawsuit in Miami-Dade County court today against Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. and Sprint Nextel Corp. for negligence related to a security breach. “I’m not even a customer of Wells Fargo bank. How did they get access to my private information?” says Karantsalis.
On December 11, 2007, Karantsalis received a letter from Sprint Nextel Corp. stating in part that “a customer logged in through the CheckFree service on the Wells Fargo banking website and, when they clicked on a link to see their current Sprint invoice, they were erroneously presented with your invoice instead.”
“These companies have a lot of explaining to do,” says Karantsalis. “The right to privacy is a personal and fundamental right protected by the Constitution.”

[Tom Senter]

Hi - my employer has given us two March dates from which to choose a 'mandatory' all-day Saturday meeting. We are all salaried and exempt (from overtime pay) and we work Mon-Fri.

I have explained to my employer that my wife is working those two Saturdays and I would need to hire a sitter for my two eight-year-olds. This sitter in not cheap (car / drivers license / insurance, etc.). If I have to go to the meeting I'll need a sitter for almost 10 hours. The hourly rate is well above $10 per hour PLUS I'll need to give them $$ to do something since it's still winter (ice skate, lunch, gas money, etc.). I figure $150 for the 9 hours.

My employer has stated this meeting is 'mandatory' and I need to choose one of the two dates.
I asked for pay ('no') or an extra day of vacation ('no'). So we're at a stand-off.
What are my options?

'Lost in Los Altos'

You need to get Connie Rehm's job title correct.The lady is not a librarian. She is a library assistant. She did not go to library school nor hold an M.L.S.

[Martha Hinnenkamp]

The lady had worked at the library for many years without working on Sundays. Why should she have to work just because some other people made a decision to be open on Sundays? Do we respect anyone at all today? What I hear on the news is more respect for people who came to our country and flew airplanes into the world trade center than we do for our own people. I would like to hear someone say how bad it is, that Americans are taken captive and beheaded and hung up for all to see. Now that's brutality!!! I'm sorry, I know this is not what I was writing about, but I just hate the way most news stations report the news. I feel like they don't care that our freedom cost many people their lives. Thank You.