The European Court of Human Rights handed down its decision on four critical religious freedom cases, exonerating one Christian but dismissing the other three claims.

As a result, the judges ruled that her right to profess her religious beliefs should have trumped the airline’s decision to mold its image by imposing uniform rules on its staff. Eweida was awarded $2,675 in damages and $40,000 in legal costs.

However, things didn’t go as well for the other three Christians whose cases involved an infringement of their religious liberty.

Shirley Chaplin, who worked as a nurse at a government-run hospital, was also told she could no longer wear her cross to work, even after having done so for more than 30 years, and sued the hospital. The judges ruled against the 54 year-old nurse, saying that wearing the cross was not a “mandatory requirement” of her faith and that the hospital had acted in a reasonable manner to try to mediate the situation.

Lillian Ladele, a Christian Registrar for the London Borough of Islington, sued her employer for dismissing her when she refused to perform same-sex marriages because they violated her religious beliefs. Ladelle, who was appointed before passage of the Civil Partnership Act 2004, was able to swap shifts with colleagues so she would not have to compromise her faith but a rules change made that impossible. A pair of homosexual registrars complained about her refusal to perform gay unions she was promptly dismissed even after years of exemplary service.

In what many are calling a frightening decision, the judges ruled that religious beliefs cannot be used to justify discrimination against the LGBT community.

Gary McFarlane suffered much the same fate when the judges ruled that the successful counselor for a large national counseling service was rightfully dismissed from his job after stating that providing same-sex couples with psycho-sexual counseling would be against his religious beliefs. The Court ruled that religious belief was not a strong enough reason to infringe on rights protected under the European Convention on Human Rights.

Two judges issued a blistering dissent in the three dismissed cases, saying that the rights of Christians were being sacrificed on the altar of “obsessive political correctness” contrary to the values of a democratic society. They likened the treatment of Ladelle to conscientious objectors of the past who suffered “at the hands of the Spanish Inquisition or a Nazi firing squad”.

Paul Lambdin, a partner at Stevens & Bolton told the Telegraph that the rulings, if allowed to stand, will result in people of faith and others who disagree with same sex marriage being excluded from certain jobs.

“These cases demonstrate the difficulty of divorcing a belief from its practice,” he said. “The practical effect is that Miss Ladele, Mr McFarlane and others with similar religious convictions may be lawfully excluded from certain jobs.”

ADF Senior Counsel Roger Kiska agrees. While calling Eweida’s win a victory for religious freedom, the rulings in the other cases were extremely disappointing.

“Christian employees should not be singled out for discrimination. No one should have to hide their faith or act contrary to it. This type of intolerance is inconsistent with the values of civilized communities.”

He is hoping that Chaplin, Ladelle and McFarlane will appeal their decision to the Grand Chamber of the court.

Pope Benedict XVI decried this very scenario in a major speech to the Vatican Diplomatic Corps earlier this month when he warned that new definitions of human rights created to suit personal agendas are causing an increasing intolerance of Christianity and of Christians who object to so-called “equality” laws.

“Outlawing individual and institutional conscientious objection in the name of liberty and pluralism opens the door to intolerance and forced uniformity,” he said.

He went on to warn that without tolerance for Christianity and those who conscientiously object, these revised ideas about human rights can lead to “intolerance or even violence towards individuals, symbols of religious identity and religious institutions.”

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