One conversation, two rules

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NICK EICHER, HOST: It’s Friday the 10th of April. Glad to have you along for today’s edition of The World and Everything in It. 

Good morning, I’m Nick Eicher.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown.

First up: A workplace conversation about faith, and whether answering a question can cost you your job.

EICHER: A college student working in a coffee shop says she got fired, not for starting a discussion on faith, but for answering questions about it.

WORLD’s Travis Kircher has our story from Louisville.

SOUND: [Heine Bros. coffee shop]

TRAVIS KIRCHER: The sounds at Heine Brothers coffee shop in south Louisville are familiar to nineteen-year-old Paige Rogers.

ROGERS: I started working at Heine brothers, kind of just to have a job for the... school semester...

As a freshman at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary’s Boyce College, she started working at Heine Brothers in 2024 and was promoted to shift manager soon after. Then the company hired her back for her sophomore year without an interview. 

But she says things changed after a conversation with her coworkers last October.

ROGERS: It was probably about 10-15 minutes into the shift, when they asked me where I went to school. And in response to that, they asked me if I was waiting till marriage…

More specifically, was she saving sexual intimacy for marriage. Rogers says her coworkers began sharing about their own dating lives and asked her about her faith in Christ.

She says at one point, a coworker told her she was in multiple relationships including a homosexual one.

ROGERS: She basically asked, I think it was, "If I were to become a Christian, would I have to stop loving my partner?" And I responded respectfully, sharing my beliefs…

Rogers said she told her homosexuality is a sin, but that we’re all sinners and that she doesn’t judge. She says she ended her shift feeling good about the conversation.

ROGERS: As Christians, that's a joy. It's a joy to be able to share the gospel with people and to share the good news that Jesus saves.

But twelve days later, Rogers was fired by text message. She was told she violated company policy by having unwelcome religious conversations. The company said those conversations left several people uncomfortable and offended.

ROGERS: Out of shock and confusion, I just replied, “Does this apply even if they asked me an inappropriate question first?” And she said, “Unfortunately, yes.”

According to the text message, the company said the conversation had been captured on security footage. Heine Brothers declined Rogers' request to review that footage, saying that would be against company policy.

Since then, Rogers has filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, alleging religious discrimination.

MARTIN: This lawsuit is about Title VII and respect for religious employees.

Rogers attorney is Cliff Martin of First Liberty Institute. He accuses Heine Brothers of firing Rogers simply because the company didn’t like her religious views.

MARTIN: Where an employee is respectfully engaging in religious conversation and answering questions, the employer cannot pick a side and terminate the religious employee in favor of the unreligious employee.

He also accused the company of failing to use progressive discipline, pointing out that Rogers was fired without warning and was given no opportunity to defend herself. Kentucky is a right-to-work state that allows companies to fire employees at-will, but that doesn’t affect federal discrimination claims.

Then there’s the way the conversation began, with Rogers’ coworker asking about her view on premarital sex.

MARTIN: Paige was asked incredibly sensitive questions about her beliefs, and those would make any religious person uncomfortable, but the employer showed no interest in finding out if Paige was offended…

And Rogers says when she pressed Heine Brothers HR about her termination, the company abruptly changed its reasons for firing her. She said she was later told she was let go for frequent call-ins, scheduling difficulties, and communications problems. 

She says that’s not in-line with her character, or the original reasons she was given in that lengthy text message.

WORLD reached out to Heine Brothers, both by phone and through its online contact form, asking for the company’s side of the story. To date, we have not received a response.

For her part, Rogers says she doesn’t know who filed the complaint because she hasn’t been able to review the evidence, but she says it doesn’t matter, because she did nothing wrong. She was just giving honest answers to hard questions posed by her coworkers.

ROGERS: In no world should any Christian have to hide their faith just to not get fired. As Christians, we're called to be unashamed of the gospel, and I am unashamed of the gospel.

She also has a message for those coworkers with whom she shared the gospel.

ROGERS: I want them to know that, that Christ loves them. And I have been praying for them, my family's been praying for them…I pray that they will come to Christ and recognize Jesus as their Savior.

Heine Brothers has until April 24 to respond to the complaint against it. From there, the complaint can be settled through mediation. If that fails, the EEOC can launch its own investigation to determine if actual discrimination took place.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Travis Kircher in Louisville, Kentucky.

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