Back in July I took note of the changes in Department of Labor regulations such that religious groups are now allowed to make adherence to a particular set of beliefs a condition of employment:

The second thing I want you to notice is the straw man on which this is all based:

Currently, faith-based institutions can be barred from competing for federal contracts if they hire staff in accordance with their religious beliefs. The Labor Department will revise the current regulation to conform with Title 7 of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and make it clear that faith-based institutions that secure government contracts are not barred from hiring members of their own faith.

Federal regulations have never barred anyone or any organization from hiring members of their own faith.

What they did was forbid excluding people for the sole reason that they are NOT members of their own faith. In other words, they forbade religious discrimination. Now, not having read the new regs directly I can only infer their content (and therefore impact) from the press release.

My problem is seeing the agency responsible for enforcing the law willfully misrepresent it. As written, it doesn't authorize a direct requirement that one belong to a specific faith. It DOES, however, authorize requiring a specific set of beliefs; there's no other meaning possible for "hire staff in accordance with their religious beliefs."

You may be hard-pressed to see the difference. I understand. Totally.

Well…

Quote of note:

When a conservative Catholic group brought this to the attention of his employer, saying Kerry's positions were not in keeping with Catholic beliefs, Ekeh was fired, he said. The organization told him he was being let go for using a work computer to make political postings during work hours.

The conference declined through a spokesman to comment.

And don't think "beliefs" can't be extended to include politics. In fact…

An Evolution at Work
Tiptoeing Around the Party Line
By Amy Joyce
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, September 5, 2004; Page F01

David Fernandez tolerated the sounds of Rush Limbaugh emanating from his boss's radio. He even liked to defend the National Public Radio broadcasts playing on his own radio.

But this back-and-forth -- what he once considered interesting conversation -- turned hostile this summer when, he said, his boss accused him of being "sad and unstable" when Fernandez argued his support for presidential candidate Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.).

And when the boss's mother began blanketing the office with e-mails arguing for the reelection of President Bush, Fernandez tried sending out some of his own -- but was ordered to stop.

So it was then, in early July, that Fernandez decided he was getting out. "This place is crazy," he said. He packed up his desk at the graphic design firm in San Marcos, Tex., and moved to California, where he enrolled in the Art Institute of California at San Diego. His former employer declined to comment on the situation.