One of the nation’s leading church-state separation groups has requested U.S. Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer cancel a department-wide prayer service scheduled for Dec. 10.
Christopher Line
“While you are free to participate in religious events and promote your personal religious beliefs in your capacity as a citizen, you cannot use government resources or the Department of Labor to advance your personal religious beliefs,” Christopher Line, an attorney for the Freedom from Religion Foundation, said in a Dec. 3 letter to Chavez-DeRemer.
The advocacy group for agnostics, atheists and freethinkers learned of the planned service from a social media post by Hemant Mehta, an author and blogger known as the “Friendly Atheist.”
The announcement from the department’s Center for Faith features an image of hands in prayer and invites all interested employees to the inaugural “Secretary’s Prayer Service” to be held in the Cesar Chavez Auditorium and shared online.
Lori M. Chavez-DeRemer
The situation stems from the Trump administration’s July directive permitting and even encouraging federal workers to proselytize while on the job.
“Employees may engage in conversations regarding religious topics with fellow employees, including attempting to persuade others of the correctness of their own religious views, provided that such efforts are not harassing in nature,” according to the memo from Scott Kupor, director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. “Employees may also encourage their coworkers to participate in religious expressions of faith, such as prayer, to the same extent that they would be permitted to encourage coworkers participate in other personal activities.”
Managers may also engage in religious activities during work time, the directive continues. “The constitutional rights of supervisors to engage in such conversations should not be distinguished from non-supervisory employees by the nature of their supervisory roles.”
Even before that memo was issued, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth launched a monthly series of worship and prayer services at the Pentagon.
The inaugural “Secretary of Defense Christian Prayer and Worship Service” in May included Hegseth’s own pastor proclaiming President Donald Trump to be “sovereignly appointed,” The New York Times reported.
“This is precisely where I need to be, and I think exactly where we need to be as a nation, at this moment,” Hegseth said. “Knowing that there’s an author in heaven overseeing all of this, who’s underwritten all of it, for us, on the Cross, gives me the strength to proceed.”
The Labor Department proclaimed its pro-religious stance in a September announcement strongly encouraging faith groups to apply to it for federal grants.
“This is just the beginning of a series of actions and resources we will be unveiling to make the Department of Labor faith-friendly again. Prayer and work — ‘ora et labora’ — do not need to be mutually exclusive in our society when many faith organizations stand ready to help more Americans with the skills and support necessary to get and keep great jobs.”
But Chavez-DeRemer’s prayer service is a clear violation of the separation of church and state mandated by the U.S. Constitution, Line said in his letter to the secretary.
The event communicates to nonparticipants that they are “outsiders” and “not full members in the political community” if they don’t join in, he added.
“This is just the beginning of a series of actions and resources we will be unveiling to make the Department of Labor faith-friendly again.
“Government employees have a constitutional right to be free from government coercion to observe religious practices. As the Supreme Court has put it, ‘The First Amendment mandates governmental neutrality between religion and religion, and between religion and nonreligion.’”
Americans United for Separation of Church and State recently issued a “Know Your Rights” guide for federal employees confronted with openly religious events in the workplace.
The document reminds workers the Constitution guarantees them freedom from harassment based on their religion or lack of religion.
“The federal government’s role is to serve the public, not to proselytize,” AU President Rachel Laser said. “Secretary Chavez-DeRemer is abusing the power of her government office — and potentially misusing taxpayer-funded resources — to impose religion on federal workers.”
Those who don’t attend could feel just as uncomfortable as those who attend out of concern for their jobs, she added.
“Even if this prayer service is presented as voluntary, there will be pressure on Labor Department employees to attend in order to appease their boss — especially since this event will occur amidst the Trump administration’s campaign to punish anyone who doesn’t comply with its Christian nationalist agenda,” Laser said.
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Trump admin says federal workers may proselytize