Posted on 10/21/2004 12:48:09 PM PDT by Tamar1973
Austin, Texas, United States .... [ANN Staff]
An employee fired from Dynacon, Inc. of Bryan, Texas, for religious beliefs protected under federal law is seeking reinstatement to his job. Hector Rivera wants his welder's job restored, along with back pay and punitive damages, according to a lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. Representing Rivera is attorney Malcolm Greenstein of Austin.
Rivera joined Dynacon in 1988 as a welder and became a member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in May 2002. He asked for, and received, accommodation for his belief that he should not work on Saturday, the biblical Sabbath. A new supervisor ended that practice in August 2002; when Rivera refused to work on a Saturday, he was terminated.
"This is only one of many examples of illegal discrimination against Sabbath-keepers," said Mitchell Tyner, an associate counsel for the Seventh-day Adventist Church world headquarters. "Every year more than 1,000 Adventists [in the United States] are either denied employment or lose their jobs over their religious beliefs, which are guaranteed protection under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act."
According to Tyner, the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission reports an 80 percent increase in religious discrimination cases during the past five years. Seventh-day Adventists, observant Jews, and members of other faith communities are among those who regularly suffer discrimination for requesting accommodation.
"If 'law' can only mean Torah --- then what does "lawless' mean? Anti-Torah? In the case of lawlessness, I happen to agree that Torah is indeed meant -- that the sign of the end times would be "Torah-lessness." Christians often brag that they are "free from law" not realizing that's just a seemingly nice way of saying "without law" or "having no law." See note on "Law of Christ"--Ellen Kavanaugh "Oddly, In the same breath Christians claim Yeshua *was* G-d, they manage to say the "Law of Christ" is not the same as "Law of G-d" (that is, Torah). Many Christians claim the "Law of Christ" is "And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these. Mark 12:30,31."-Ellen Kavanaugh
Yet they forget that these were written in Torah first.
Deuteronomy 6:5 And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might"
Leviticus 19:18 "Do not make attempts to get equal with one who has done you wrong, or keep hard feelings against the children of your people, but have love for your neighbour as for yourself: I am the Lord."
"Yeshua's Law *is* G-d's Law. Where the Law of Messiah differs isn't in regard to G-d's Law, but man's. Yeshua came to correctly interpret Torah. Man had added to G-d's Law in an attempt to fence and protect G-d's Law, and in the process, parts of G-d's Law had been misunderstood. Yeshua helped define what the Law was really teaching (Matthew 5's "Sermon on the Mount" is an excellent example of Yeshua clarifying Torah). When Yeshua summed up the Law into these two commands, he was conveying essential principles -- love G-d and love your neighbour. But how does G-d want us to love Him? How does He want us to love our neighbor? We're back to Torah -- we need Torah to define "how" to love G-d and our neighbour."--Ellen Kavanaugh
Romans 2:13 "(For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified)."
Romans 3:31 "Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law."
Romans 7:12 "Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good."
Romans 7:14 "For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin."
Romans 7:22 "For I delight in the law of God after the inward man."
Me too.
Of course, the missus church has tried to foment a divorce.
She's an Adventist.
I am not.
And considering the behavior her church has shown towards me and my marraige, I won't ever consider being an Adventist.
Long story, and not worth relating, but it is what happened.
Yes, not all SDA congregations are going to behave like that towards me and may be better witnesses than the congregation I mentioned.
But I have yet to run across one.
So you would IGNORE what is said in Galatians?
The New Covenant does not cancel the Old covenant but rather enables its members to keep the Torah as it says in Jeremiah "and I will write my Torah on the tables of their hearts." (See in Jer. 31 where it talks about the New Covenant.) The early Church fathers (after the Apostles died) disregarded this passage in Galatians and Paul's other writings and assumed that the New Covenant by virtue of it being new set aside and rendered the Old Covenant void. And all of Christianity sadly followed suit. They didn't understand that Yeshua declared in the Gospels "I have not come to abolish the Torah, but rather to fulfill the Torah."
In their Anti-Semetic rush to avoid all things Jewish, they disconnected themsevles from the Schoolmaster which could teach them what sin was, what the penalty for sin was and how G-d would work to change the penalty of sin forever through the coming Messiah.
Your post would be excellent, if it were not for the book of Galatians.
...to the chagrin of most real, traditional Adventists who would not consider participating in such pagan notions.
No more than you ignore Torah and most of Paul's writings, particulary in Romans.
Considering the fact they accomodated him in the past, I would said that this case is CLEARLY a case of religious discrimination.
Hey, you're the guy ignoring stuff.
I'd be careful with that you know.
Try Ephesians as well while you're at it.
If a business owner wants to accommodate religious beliefs, fine. If he doesn't, that should be fine, too.
When the new testament lists sins, Sabbath breaking is conspicuously absent;
In Mark 7:21-22 13 sins are listed. Jesus did not mention breaking the Sabbath.
In Romans 1:29-32 20 sins are listed and not one of them is Sabbath breaking.
In Galatians 5:19-21 a list of 15 sins are given, not one of them is Sabbath breaking.
In 2 Timothy 3:1-4 there's a list of 18 sins, but not once is Sabbath breaking mentioned.
Don't you find it peculiar that nowhere in the New Testament is it taught that the fourth commandment must be observed?
Yeshua was certainly NOT a sabbath breaker, he was simply accused of such. Are you calling Yeshua a sinner?! If this is what youo meant than you are dead in your sins because His death would have availed you nothing!
He healed on the Sabbath and did good on the Sabbath.
In other words, that was work, and He said that He did what He saw His Father doing.
Fascinating, right?
That's fine but they established an a precedent when they allowed him off previously. Fire me fine, but don't object when I catch you at the local bar and bust your head for you. Of course that's my personal view of dealing with sh*thead supervsiors.
Acts 15 prescribes basic Jewish practices for Gentiles to follow with the injunction that they will learn Moses in the synogogues on the Sabbath and learn the rest there? Yet now, most Christian churches only teach Torah as bed time stories?
Paul over and over again lauded and upheld Torah, yet Christians trample it under foot and then have the nerve to say that they are "free" to do so?
Romans 2:13 "(For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified)."
Romans 3:31 "Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law."
Romans 7:12 "Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good."
Romans 7:14 "For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin."
Romans 7:22 "For I delight in the law of God after the inward man."
The very idea that you think that the NT is a trump card over the OT rather than an elaboration on it shows the root of your error. If you think those NT lists of sins are exhaustive, you make James and the Acts 15 counsel to be liars because they believed that it would be greatly beneficial for the new beleivers to learn Torah.
I wish you'd tell my company that. We've been working a problem since Tuesday morning with three hours sleep a night. Of course the management gets to work in shifts. But hey, that's why I get the big bucks.
It might appear that way, but maybe not.
"He asked for, and received, accommodation for his belief that he should not work on Saturday"
If this constituted an employment contract with the company, he probably has grounds to stand on.
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