Max Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 My company subscribes to a newsletter that is oriented toward the management of architecture and engineering firms. Normally, the lead article is some cranky rambling on the importance of personal relationships in marketing or how to groom your staff for advancement or how to improve collections. The newest issue presents the editor's identification of trends in the A/E industry for 2008. Among the list of items on profitability and markets was this little gem: More religion will be coming into the workplace. One large A/E/P firm I am aware of hired chaplains for each of its offices. It's definitely becoing more common to see certain religions influences inside the comapny, particularly in the souther and Heartland states. WTF! I was working under the (hopeful?) premise that my company was particularly tight-butt conservative, but now this guy is telling me thinks go way farther than us. Has anyone else seen anything like this? In my workplace, someone decides to circulate an email telling us to "pray for ..whoever.." when there's bad news to announce, and a recent brown bag lecture on ethics almost got scrapped because the boss feared that the outside speaker would be "too politally correct" and thereby not give enough emphasis on a xtian basis for ethics. (Since when is emphasizing xtian faith politically incorrect?) And as a company stockholder, I'd sure be pissed if the company started frittering away profits on a company chaplain!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MathGeek Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 And as a company stockholder, I'd sure be pissed if the company started frittering away profits on a company chaplain!!! Great point. Great argument. I'll play devil's advocate for a bit. How much money does your company blow on hiring "outside consulates" how to proceed on issues related within your company? Considering how creative the accounts department and human resources can get, who wouldn't say that the "company chaplain" is really a "morale-boosting consultant"? Now for my flawed analysis... I haven't heard of this before, but it seems to be a symptom of how badly people in this country are either too depressed or too stupid, or a combination thereof, when it comes to the collective well-being of our nation. I really think the great majority of American citizens want a nation rooted in the feel-good religiosity and the tight punishment that is equivalent to what God hands down in the book of Revelation. According to Christian sources I've culled, there have been many supposed methods to bring about wellness that have failed over the last few decades. One reason for this is that it is not rooted in the Scriptures. Whether or not the Christian dogma is adhered to casually or dogmatically, it seems that a religious theocracy really may be on the horizon. Just look at Huckabee's performance in Iowa. This is why the non-religious, liberally religious and peacefully religious need to band together to stop this radical right-winged Christian upsurge. This is why we need to fight every bit of religious influence on every conceivable front. In short, fight your ass off to see that your company doesn't hire that politically-correct coined "morale-boosting consultant". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ouroboros Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 I saw this happen with some companies while I was Christian, back in Sweden, and it's not good for the company itself. One of them had a "prophet" and even a prayer room. They even called themselves "a Christian company", which is quite stupid because how in the world can a virtual entity in any way or fashion be "born again"? Both companies went out of business in a few years, because of bad decisions. God doesn't help companies, and back then I realized that God doesn't help companies because he only helps people and companies are a non-issue, while now of course I know he doesn't help because he can't, since he doesn't exist. Overall, it's very stupid. Such an idiotic idea. Why don't they start casting out demons from their servers and computers while they're at it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amethyst Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 I don't think advocating one religion over another belongs in the workplace, period. Christians like to think that they are the only religion. Well, they are not. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ro-bear Posted January 5, 2008 Share Posted January 5, 2008 My workplace is a school. A few years back, the teacher who sponsors the Fellowship of Christian Athletes decided it would be a swell idea to post bible verses all over the school. After all, the FCA is an approved school organization, and other school organizations get to post stuff like home ec projects, art, poetry, etc. Still, I thought it was somehow inappropriate. One of my fellow teachers felt the same way, despite being a devout southern Baptist. She was a fine lady who happened to know of some Jewish and Muslim students who might feel a bit marginalized by all the New Testament stuff all over the place. We separately approached the principal about it. I must have passed Mr. P----'s office three times before I summoned the courage to enter (I was untenured at the time). I spoke my bit, and he scratched his head and said, "You know, when Mr. A----- asked me if he could post the verses, I approved it without even thinking about it. Now I'm not so comfortable with it. Do you really think it bothers anyone?" I assured him that it did, and offered a hypothetical for him. What if the Scholars' Bowl group I sponsored wanted to post some materialist/rationalist quotations from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries? I handed him a sheet I had prepared for this purpose. He saw the Jefferson quotes and paled a bit. I think the one that goes "And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerve in the brain of Jupiter" did the trick. The next thing he said was "What if we leave them up for the rest of the week and take them down Friday afternoon? I'd prefer to resolve this as quietly as possible." Happily, my principal was a man of principle. Our encounter did not damage our working relationship in the least. On the contrary, he selected me to accompany him to a leadership workshop the next year. And recommended me for tenure. I attended Mr P----'s funearal a couple of years ago. It was held at an old Presbyterian church in Knoxville. There were dozens of students there, and quite a few teachers. I often reflect on how differently things might have gone if a lesser administrator had been in charge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MathGeek Posted January 6, 2008 Share Posted January 6, 2008 Happily, my principal was a man of principle. Our encounter did not damage our working relationship in the least. On the contrary, he selected me to accompany him to a leadership workshop the next year. And recommended me for tenure. I am a teacher myself, and in a district where religion is never brought up as a topic of discussion in staff and school board meetings. In fact, our school board has a pastor of an Assemblies of God Church serving on it, but he does both jobs without any overlap. Apparently, he has done some good by being on there. My old principal was a pastor as well, but only brought up religion when we were visiting in his office informally and when I inquired about it. It seemed to amplify the man's ability to deal with problem students and stressed-out parents. Strangely, such set-ups have worked really well out here and still do since the old principal was replaced. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluewizard Posted January 6, 2008 Share Posted January 6, 2008 When I recently worked as my job at Wal Mart, religion was never something brought up by management nor was it asked which one you were, one of the store's principles was respect for the individual which was good, but a lot of my coworkers would go on and on about how the Lord blessed them and things like that, but I guess that's to be expected in rural Tennessee. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MathGeek Posted January 6, 2008 Share Posted January 6, 2008 When I recently worked as my job at Wal Mart, religion was never something brought up by management nor was it asked which one you were, one of the store's principles was respect for the individual which was good, but a lot of my coworkers would go on and on about how the Lord blessed them and things like that, but I guess that's to be expected in rural Tennessee. Strangely, I used to work for "Uncle Sam Walton" a few years ago and my best friends were Christians and we engaged in those kinds of deep and spiritual conversations. I also met a couple of atheists working there. Go figure I guess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MultifariousBirdLady Posted January 8, 2008 Share Posted January 8, 2008 I get a free business/trade magazine targeted at my profession and people engaged in similar activities. The owners of the business are evangelicals, and if you go to the business website, or scroll to the bottom of their emails, they always have bible verses and a link where you can join some kind of Christian business club. For the past two or three years at least, their December issue of the trade magazine sports a cover featuring Christian icons (stylized cross-shaped stars, mangers) along with a picture of president Bush and something from the military like a tank. None of this has anything whatsoever to do with the actual profession. Thankfully, it's free. I can clip any articles that happen to be useful and recycle rest without feeling like I'm wasting money. What a waste of paper, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts