Unwed Catholic Teacher CannedFollow

The Story

Basically, she told them she caught preggers and had no intention of marrying. They came back and told her that she had to go find another job because she didn't have one with them any more. She's suing for wrongful dismissal. They have a stated policy that teachers cannot violate the tenets of Catholic morality.

I'm of the opinion that the school is within its rights to impose that restriction upon its employees and that her dismissal is justified, even if it isn't the sort of thing that gives you warm tingly feelings during the holiday season.

However, I can see the other side of this as well. Where do an employer's rights end and an employees rights begin? Where is the line? I know my own employer has conduct clauses in their policies and they are so vague that they could be used as an excuse to fire you for farting in public. To my knowledge, they never have been abused in such a manner. But the threat is implicit: Do things we don't approve of and you could lose your job. What is the happy medium and should a religion-oriented organization be allowed to impose its tenet son its employees?

What's the difference between expecting employees to say the Lord's prayer, expecting them to say the Pledge of Allegiance, expecting them to sing the company song, and expecting them to do "normal work" if these expectations are laid out clearly at the time of hire?

While I am all for the rights of people, I think the school had a right to do what it did. Teachers are mentors for the children and if it is a Catholic school, they believe in certain moral beliefs. Teachers should uphold those if that is what they are teaching. The teacher is taking a "Do as I say not as I do" approach to her career which is not applicable. If it were a publice school she would have a firmer ground to stand on. But it's not and she broke the code of what she is trying to instill in her students.

As opposed to the moral code of casting out the woman from the flock as a harlot.

Just like Jesus would do!

It's a horrid thing, but I dunno. When I first read the post, I initially thought that they are a private school run by a church, so they can do that. But then I read Jophiel's post. I would be interested to see what the law exactly says about it. The way it is worded I'll bet is fuzzy and probably boils down to judges interpretation.

Wouldnt it depend on the contract she signed. Im assuming she signed some sort of contract. If there are provisions in it that state she must adhere to all Catholic doctrine etc then I would think the firing was legal regardless of laws protecting women from firing if they get pregnant. I would assume those laws were passed to keep employers from canning women to save on insurance/baby leave etc.

That law, singular, is Federal and is an anti-discrimination statute. It may or may not apply, depending on how it's argued.

The laws of New York, I'm pretty sure, do not require adherence to Catholic doctrine.

However, as I said, if the employment laws in NY state are at-will, then she can be fired for violating company policy - in this case, violating Catholic tenets and mores.

You can't sign away your rights? I've got some stern words for the Marines then, let me tell you.

I'm thinking that they can argue it, legally, from the basis that they're not canning her for getting pregant, but for getting pregnant out of wedlock and having no intention to marry. I'm sure they'll whip out precedents of action where unwed teachers have become pregnant and got married and they kept them employed. They're going to aruge that she is unwilling to adhere to the tenets they hold dear and require their employees to follow as a condition of employment. Or at least that's the tact I see as most obvious to succeed.

Not kindly. But that was more of a social issue than a doctrinal one. In fact, a quick look through New Advent didn't turn up any doctrinal issues saying that unwed mothers needed to be expunged. Pre-marital sex is a sin and no one advocates getting knocked-up outside of marriage but such can be said for a great many things.

I did find this quote (regarding abortion) on AmericanCatholic:

You realize that what you did was very wrong. What you may not realize is that no sin is beyond God’s power to forgive. If it were, the sin would be greater than God—and that is not possible.

Again, if we're arguing morals, I have a hard time weighing a woman who made a mistake and is trying to support herself and her child who she intends to have against a group of Christians looking to tack a scarlet letter to her and cast her out for being a *****.

Well Jophiel, the Bible does say "Let he who is without sin (or catholic) cast the first stone."

It's more of an issue of the schools right to have their definition of morality upheld as a condition of employment. Hypocrisy of the Church's stance on the issue is irrelevant.

God is responsible for forgiving an unwed mother, not the school and as such amends must be made with HIM and don't apply to the school or the Church. That's ok too, because God is so into the whole forgiveness thing, the people at the school can be forgiven if they fu[b][/b]ck up too. Win/Win everyone gets to go to heaven, the lady just can't work for the school in the mean time.

Agreed, it's two seperate debates. DSD was arguing the moral correctness in firing her though so I was giving a morally based retort. But neither has much to do with Federal statute.

I'm not even arguing wehther they had the 'right' to fire her (aside from pointing out the moral hypocrisy). Like I said, lots of companies place personal life restrictions on their employees. The difference here being that the restriction they place potentially violates federal law.

The one cited precedent (in New York, at that) showed that this could, indeed, be a violation of the law.