Religious accommodation means no Saturdays....ever?

[momto6msn]

Hey all - I'm looking for input on the following situation:

a co-worker has been granted a religious accommodation to never work a Saturday (hospital ICU, where everyone is scheduled every other weekend). She does not have to work every Sunday, and they have not filled the hole her not working as created. As you can imagine, our Saturdays are horrible. I have gone to our union - NYSNA - but they are not willing to do anything.

She is also scheduled 8 hours less every two weeks than the rest of us, yet still maintains full-time benefits even though she is actually working what is considered part-time.

I'm becoming extremely resentful......am I valid feeling this way, or should I just mind my own business?

[SummitRN, BSN, RN]

3-4 vents because of crappy staffing...

Hey what hospital so that I do my utmost to murmur "don't take me there" to the paramedics?

Seriously, abusing religion to get work perks is a load of crap that does not have to be honored by management. If they do, they are screwing themselves and everyone because it will naturally breed resentment.

I'm starting a religion that bans working nights, wiping poop, and getting paid less than 100K. I demand you respect my religion!

[OyWithThePoodles, RN]

I can see where it would be frustrating having a co-worker off every Saturday while you pick up the slack, or work more than your required weekend days.

But if management allowed this, then there should be a hole in the schedule what would be her Saturdays, management should fill this hole before posting the schedule. Where it gets sticky is if they are pulling other nurses who have already done their required weekend to fill this hole, not fair.

Also, I feel if she cannot work Saturdays, she should be made to work Sundays. When I worked at the hospital, I did not want to work Sundays because of church. I would've never have thought to get "religious exemption" so I found a co-worker whose son's played sports every Saturday. She agreed to work my Sunday's and I worked her Saturdays. Of course I worked every Saturday, but not missing church was that important to me.

This is not your co-workers fault, it is management. From not properly filling in the holes, to unsafe staffing.

ETA: I will say we did have a couple of co-workers get mad because they felt we weren't putting in their days. For educated people they couldn't see that me working every Saturday and being on Sunday is the same as you working every other weekend. Of course, I think they were just mad that they didn't figure it out first, because as soon as one of us left the floor, they were the first one to jump in and ask if they could split weekends.

[SmilingBluEyes]

I don't see a lot of resent toward the individual nurse as much as toward the situation which is unfair and untenable. WHY should everyone else have to pick up the slack because this person cannot work Saturdays? The Union is worthless. They need to assign another nurse to work that day that the nurse cannot. NO ONE should have to take care of 3-4 vents because this nurse cannot. And furthermore, this nurse needs to work every Sunday then, to make it fair. It's also unfair to the patients as it is an unsafe staffing situation.

The situation is very wrong, creating anger and resentment among other staff. The religious nurse WILL feel it. It may not be right, but that is how it will be. The nurse COULD help her own situation by offering to help the others by lessening THEIR burden, but I see no evidence of this. So she may get some pushback and maybe, it's deserved. One hand washes the other.

[DeeAngel]

I think you need to embrace your childhood religion and demand to have every Sunday off as part of the religious doctrine you practice. If it's fair for the other worker it should be fair for you too.

[~Mi Vida Loca~RN, ASN, RN]

I'm Jewish. It's all down to how religious you are. The more orthodox Jews will take things to extreme, and right from sundown on Friday night won't even go as far as turning on a light switch as creating electricity can be considered as work. No TV, no lights, nothing. I grew up in that environment, not my family specifically, but others where I lived and those who I went to school with (I went to Jewish schools). It was quite common where I'm from for orthodox Jews not to work on Saturdays. In my country it is required to make accommodations for religious people to follow their faith, for example allowing muslim workers the time and space to pray 6 times a day. I'm not religious at all (in fact I'm an atheist) but as long as it doesn't harm anyone I don't have issue with accommodations being made. That said, if your company are making those allowances it's up to them to provide coverage for everyone else for those times. You shouldn't resent or blame your coworker, you should blame the company.

I do think it can get out of hand and be kind of ridiculous though. I remember a few years ago when I lived in a very orthodox Jewish part of London. The locals petitioned the town to place a string or cord high up on lampposts all around the area to denote that it was a contained religious area that they could call "inside" as they had more freedom to do things on the Sabbath if they were "inside", so they though they if they called outside inside they could do more stuff. That's like rewriting things to suit yourself and I remember thinking how ridiculous that was. I think religion is kind of ridiculous all the way around but people gotta do what they gotta do.

I was very surprised to hear how hmmm trying to think of the word I would use. Detailed?? Probably that's not right but anyway, but detailed things are with the rules. Our Pastor goes to Israel once a year and invites members of the church to go too. He just got back 2 weeks ago and before he went he was telling us how detailed things are there to kind of prepare us if we wanted to go. He was saying how you can't use the elevators on Sabbath and all the things that would be considered work. I am hoping to go on one of these trips in the next few years, I want to do one of our mission trips next year first. Anyway your post made me think about that. I am always interested in learning how much things differ.

[vintage_RN, BSN, RN]

I didn't read through all the posts. But I am a church-going person...it is extrememly important to me. However, I miss 2 out of 4 church services in a month because I have to work. I hate it. I hate missing my services...but my employer and the union would probably laugh if I asked for an accomodation to have every Sunday off. If all the nurses asked for an accomodation to have a certain day off, we'd be even shorter than we already are! My two cents.

[Purple_roses]

It definitely is your business because it involves your patient ratios, patient safety, and the ability for you to do your job effectively. I agree with the others that this is management's faux-pas. It's awesome that they cater to peoples' religions, but they should have a game plan in place so that they can make those accommodations safely.

[Kooky Korky, BSN, RN]

I'm Jewish. It's all down to how religious you are. The more orthodox Jews will take things to extreme, and right from sundown on Friday night won't even go as far as turning on a light switch as creating electricity can be considered as work. No TV, no lights, nothing. I grew up in that environment, not my family specifically, but others where I lived and those who I went to school with (I went to Jewish schools). It was quite common where I'm from for orthodox Jews not to work on Saturdays. In my country it is required to make accommodations for religious people to follow their faith, for example allowing muslim workers the time and space to pray 6 times a day. I'm not religious at all (in fact I'm an atheist) but as long as it doesn't harm anyone I don't have issue with accommodations being made. That said, if your company are making those allowances it's up to them to provide coverage for everyone else for those times. You shouldn't resent or blame your coworker, you should blame the company.

I do think it can get out of hand and be kind of ridiculous though. I remember a few years ago when I lived in a very orthodox Jewish part of London. The locals petitioned the town to place a string or cord high up on lampposts all around the area to denote that it was a contained religious area that they could call "inside" as they had more freedom to do things on the Sabbath if they were "inside", so they though they if they called outside inside they could do more stuff. That's like rewriting things to suit yourself and I remember thinking how ridiculous that was. I think religion is kind of ridiculous all the way around but people gotta do what they gotta do.

Could you elaborate about the "inside, outside" thing you mention? Are you referring to a Sabbath day's permissible travel distance? I don't understand what more they could be allowed to do inside than outside. Thanks for clarification.

I thought Islam requires prayer 5x/day, not 6. Not sure.

As for Jewish Sabbath - The Orthodox Jews I have known begin Sabbath an hour before Friday sundown and end an hour after sundown on Saturday, just to be certain they don't start it late or end early. They are not permitted to cook, turn on a light, light a stove, carry too much weight, and there are restrictions on how far they can walk.

They are allowed to pre-cook food and keep it warm in a slow oven, they can use a timer to turn on lights or the HVAC, they can care for babies, children, animals, the elderly, and the ill/injured. They can ask a Shabbos goy (gentile neighbor) to come in and turn on lights, etc. And they are allowed to fight wars, as we have seen not so long ago.

They are not allowed to ride on the Sabbath. Apparently the purpose of Sabbath is not so much resting - it would be much easier to ride in appropriately warm or cool air, not have to deal with ice, high heels, etc. - as it is following the rules. This means that those who can't walk are pretty much relegated to staying home, although I recently saw a man pushing his elderly father in a wheelchair going to the synagogue on Saturday.

In Israel, the Orthodox have been known to throw stones at the non-observant. The Orthodox also are, or used to be, exempt from military service, while every other Jew is required to do military service upon reaching 18 years of age, as far as I know.

The belief is that Messiah will come to Earth if all Jews observe 3 Sabbaths in a row.

I do not know much at all about 7th Day Adventists other than that they observe Saturday as the day of rest, not Sunday and they are vegetarians.

While it is permitted and commendable to care for the sick on Sabbath, realize that Sabbath is the day for family, friends, and community, for spending time in prayer, study of Torah, and for relaxation and refreshment for Orthodox Jewish people. So an Orthodox Jew would likely not really want to spend every or every other Sabbath working instead of spending it with family and the community.

Is the hospital or manager wrong to not fill the spot of the Jewish worker? Of course. Why won't the union deal with it?

It's pretty easy to see who works what amount of hours if the schedule is posted. As for what benefits the person does or does not have, the person would have to have shared this info, or someone who should not have shared it did so.

Where is OP?

[floatingrib]

It's weird that she isn't required to work Sundays though. This sort of accommodation tends to be made, but it's still incredibly unfair that weekly she's working less hours and making the same pay (but this wouldn't be the nurse's fault, there's a problem with policy more so).

[SouthpawRN]

Los Angeles has the Jewish boundry line, apparently its called an ERUV — Boundaries

here is a story about it 1

[~Mi Vida Loca~RN, ASN, RN]

It's weird that she isn't required to work Sundays though. This sort of accommodation tends to be made, but it's still incredibly unfair that weekly she's working less hours and making the same pay (but this wouldn't be the nurse's fault, there's a problem with policy more so).

Or there is more to the story that we don't know about and the OP isn't aware of. Just from an HR standpoint alone she would not be able to collect full benefits and be considered a FTE .9 let's say if she isn't scheduled that. It's one thing if you have a call out and use PTO and stuff. But because of the decrease in premiums for FT employees the two have to match up together and this isn't a random thing. This is allegedly she was hired on with this deal in place. Part time schedule with full time benefits. So something isn't fitting here.

But I think it's easy in these situations (especially when resentment is prevalent) is assumptions start getting made and start getting passed around as facts. I see this a lot working in the homeless community. It's amazing how many people know someone that was holding a sign begging for money and then drove off in their Mercedes. That's what this makes me think of. Then it turns out they didn't actually know the person, but they heard of it and so on.

[DovMarcus]

I am a religious Jew and a nurse. I never work on the Sabbath. However, if a need arises, such as an emergency or a problem which persists during Friday and into Sabbath evening (Sabbath begins on Friday at Sundown), then one must break the Holy day to help another.

When I first started working I had big hesitations, lest I upset my coworkers who might fester resentment due to my "special privilege." Thankfully, none was had and I got along with everyone just fine.

Oh yeah, I worked every Christmas (even when it fell out on Hannukah- a workable holiday), New Years, Easter, Memorial Day, labor day, and Thanksgiving just to be an awesome team player.