Speakers urged governments and employers to protect freedom of religion or belief in hiring, workplace rules and public procurement.
A side event at the United Nations in Geneva placed employment at the centre of the freedom of religion or belief debate. Speakers from the World Evangelical Alliance, the International Panel of Parliamentarians for Freedom of Religion or Belief, Fundación Mejora, the Church of Scientology and civil society examined how religious identity can affect access to work, dress codes, public-sector neutrality, reasonable accommodation and public procurement. The discussion moved from France, Belgium, Switzerland and Québec to Spain and Germany, where “faith-breaker clauses” targeting Scientology were presented as a warning about how state policies can travel from public contracts into the lives of individual workers.
A right that follows people into the workplace
At the Concordia 1 Room of the Palais des Nations in Geneva on 1 July 2026, a side event organised by Fundación para la Mejora de la Vida, la Cultura y la Sociedad — Fundación Mejora — examined a question that is often treated as secondary in religious freedom debates: what happens when belief meets employment?
The event, held under the title Freedom of Religion in the Context of Employment, brought together legal experts, freedom of religion or belief advocates and civil society representatives. According to the organisers, around 40 people attended, including members of the NGO Committee on Freedom of Religion or Belief and representatives from diplomatic missions.
Opening the meeting, Iván Arjona-Pelado, President of Fundación Mejora (as well as from the Church of Scientology in Europe, and the UN Geneva NGO Committee on FoRB), framed the issue as one that concerns individuals before institutions. Freedom of religion or belief, he said, “intersects with other rights” and “specifically, with employment”. He added that the UN has repeatedly made clear that the right belongs not primarily to religious institutions but to citizens.
“When discrimination happens during employment, it is actually the citizens based on their religion or on other factors that are the ones discriminated,” Arjona-Pelado told participants. “And this comes from policies, from culture, from habits, and from history.”
That opening set the tone for a discussion that moved beyond abstract principles. The speakers focused on the ordinary spaces where discrimination can become real: a job interview, a uniform rule, a public-sector neutrality policy, a staff schedule, a tender document or a grant application.
Janet Epp Buckingham: laïcité and the narrowing of public space
Prof. Dr. Janet Epp Buckingham, who represents the World Evangelical Alliance at the UN Geneva, began by challenging the assumption that workplace discrimination is less urgent than imprisonment or physical violence. “Sometimes we think that perhaps issues of employment and freedom of religion or belief are not as important as people who are being imprisoned and people who are facing violence,” she said. “But the reality is that this is a very important topic, because most of us spend a great deal of time at work.”
For Buckingham, the workplace is not a neutral abstraction. It is where many people spend most of their waking life, build social networks and sustain their families. “It is important that we be able to do our work without facing discrimination or hostility because of our faith,” she said.
She referred to the idea, promoted by religious freedom advocates in business, that employees should be able to “bring your whole self to work”. That, she argued, requires more than private tolerance. It requires employers to accommodate religious practices and to support employees who have and express faith in appropriate ways at work.
Yet Buckingham’s central focus was not private-sector inclusion but government restrictions, especially those rooted in laïcité. She described the French concept as a form of “closed secularism” in which the state seeks to privatise religion. “You may practice your faith in your home and in a place of worship,” she explained, “but outside that, there may be restrictions.”
Comments
2 responses to “UN Geneva Event Highlights Faith Bias in the Workplace”
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Seems like we’ve got a real “serious issue” on our hands here, eh? Who knew that faith could be such a tricky business in the workplace—next, they’ll be telling us to leave our coffee preferences at home too! ☕️😏
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Seems like the UN has found a new favourite pastime: discussing how to keep faith out of the workplace. Who knew employment could be so spiritual? 😅
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Of course, nothing screams “we value diversity” like a UN event discussing how to keep faith out of the workplace—because who doesn’t want their hiring practices dictated by a committee of well-meaning bureaucrats? 😂
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