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Religious ethos and employment equality: a comparative Irish perspective

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Mark Coen
Mark Coen*
Affiliation:
Magdalen College, Oxford
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Abstract

This paper addresses, from a comparative perspective, the legal position of the lay employees of religious institutions such as schools and hospitals. The legal regimes governing ‘ethos’ in the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland and Britain are compared. The tension which exists between the right of religious schools and hospitals to uphold their ethos in a secular society on the one hand, and the rights of their employees to privacy and personal autonomy on the other, is highlighted. It will be argued that legislative reform is required to remove uncertainty from the lives of lay employees of religious institutions who work conscientiously but fear dismissal or discrimination because an aspect of their lifestyle – usually their sexuality – is considered unorthodox by their employer. The need for a change in judicial attitudes and a lessening of deference towards the actions of religious denominations is also a theme throughout.

Type
Research Article
Information
Legal Studies , Volume 28 , Issue 3 , September 2008 , pp. 452 - 474
Copyright
Copyright © Society of Legal Scholars 2008

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References

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2. Clergy and ministers of religion are traditionally viewed as appointees who have entered into their vocation accepting the conditions attaching to it – for example, the requirement of celibacy for Catholic priests. Freedom of religion also has an important impact in permitting practices which would be unlawful discrimination in a secular context, such as the disbarment of women from priesthood in certain faiths. One case which suggests that judicial attitudes to the status of ministers of religion may be changing is New Testament Church of God v Sylvester Stewart [2007] EWCA Civ 1004, in which the Court of Appeal upheld a finding of the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) that a Christian minister was an employee of his church. Whatever one's view on the legal status of religious ministers, however, it is clear that different issues arise to those applicable to lay employees doing their jobs against a religious backdrop.

3. The Catholic Church in Ireland has relinquished day-to-day control of its hospitals before its schools, although it still invokes its rights, for example in relation to the medical procedures permitted in the hospitals in which it is involved. See ‘Medical ethics of old’ The Irish Times 6 October 2005.

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