LANSING, Mich. — U.S. District Court Judge Sean F. Cox recently ruled that a Christian-run funeral home in Michigan has the right to fire a transgender employee for refusing to adhere to company dress code, according to The Christian Post.
R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes of Detroit claimed protection under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the court found “that the funeral home has met its initial burden of showing that enforcement of Title VII, and the body of sex-stereotyping case law that has developed under it, would impose a substantial burden on its ability to conduct business in accordance with its sincerely held religious beliefs,” according to Cox.
Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) represented the funeral home in the case against the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).
“The feds shouldn’t strong-arm private business owners into violating their religious beliefs, and the court has affirmed that here,” said ADF Legal Counsel Doug Wardlow.
“The government must respect the freedom of those who are seeking to serve the grieving and vulnerable. They shouldn’t be forced into violating their deepest convictions.”
EEOC filed their second-ever case in September 2014 on behalf of Amiee Stephens, who had been employed as a funeral director/embalmer since October 2007. In 2013, Stephens gave the funeral home a letter explaining she was undergoing a gender transition from male to female and would begin dressing as such.
Harris Funeral Homes later fired Stephens because what she was “proposing to do was unacceptable.” (TAB)
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