Bad News for Fired Christian is Good News for Christian Organizations

From Christianity Today's Weblog. The case at hand is LeBoon v. Lancaster Jewish Community Center. At issue: the JCC fired Linda LeBoon after a Jewish counter-missionary appeared at a Jews-for-Jesus event, saw Ms. LeBoon there, and--well, snitched. The trial court ruled that the JCC has a perfect right to fire anyone who is not spiritually in tune with the organization and the rest of its staff.

Ted Olson's point, and it's a good one, is that if a Messianic Jew (or Hebrew Christian) can get fired out of a Jewish group--even one that offers services of any kind to any and all comers--then a Christian ministry, including a Catholic charity, can fire anyone for not being a Christian. The principle is a very simple one: freedom of association. That freedom includes the freedom not to associate with any person whatever, for any reason or no reason. If "equal protection of the laws" means anything at all, then an awful lot of "problem plaintiffs" will suddenly have no room to complain.

Watch this case closely, sportsfans. We might now have a split in the circuits, which might force the US Supreme Court to grant certiorari to a number of freedom-of-association defendants and finally give the argument the attention it deserves. As for Linda LeBoon--well, she'd be welcome at my church any time.