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Being a backend engineer with occasional on-call responsibilities, this is an unfortunate reality I've had to deal with. My religious tradition (reformed evang

Being a backend engineer with occasional on-call responsibilities, this is an unfortunate reality I've had to deal with. My religious tradition (reformed evangelical christian) takes the sabbath pretty seriously, as stated in the Westminster Confession of Faith: > VIII. This Sabbath is to be kept holy unto the Lord when men, after a due preparing of their hearts, and ordering of their common affairs beforehand, do not only observe an holy rest all the day from their own works, words, and thoughts about their worldly employments and recreations, but also are taken up the whole time in the public and private exercises of his worship, and in the duties of necessity and mercy. Notice the last statement makes an allowance for acts of mercy and duties of necessity, which would certainly include things like being a Doctor or a Policeman, but I've always considered my duties as a Software Engineer being on-call to be borderline on whether or not they meet that standard. Certainly my employer(s) have thought they were necessary... But who are we kidding. Most of this stuff isn't life or death and waiting till Monday to get it fixed probably wouldn't be that big of a deal. (I should probably mention that although these are the standards of the Church I attend they're rarely enforced in any meaningful sense - being treated more as a matter of personal conscience than of discipline... and particularly when it comes to the Sabbath) Still I wrestle with it... not having a firm enough conviction to quit a job where I've had to do it, though if it were an every week thing, particularly if I had to regularly miss the Sunday service, I almost certainly would. If I could make one plea, it would be for tolerance and compromise. I realize religious beliefs can be pretty weird in this day and age, but they're often sincerely held, and there's usually a solution available if the company is willing to consider it. (for example I'm just fine being on-call any other day of the week, and a surprising oddity of the reformed tradition, we don't really have religious holidays: https://heidelblog.net/2017/03/the-westminster-divines-on-holy-days/ https://heidelblog.net/2017/03/the-westminster-divines-on-ho...)

hso1 8y ago
I really appreciate people with convictions. I can see that the Sabbath issue is important to you, I'd only like to point out that, if one is to take it seriously, it's important to realize Sabbath is, and always has been, Saturday, the seventh day of the week.
- gotocake 8y ago
  I can’t speak for Christian interpretations, but the Torah is very clear on this subject, and Saturday is Shabbat. Because of how Jewish law is structured that leads to it being from sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday. I’m also under the impression that Christians more or less don’t follow the original law, and that includes Shabbat. Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. As I said, what I don’t know about the daily practice of Christianity could fill volumes, but outside of some obvious cherry picking of Leviticus it seems that they have their own thing going. Certainly a whole host of laws from keeping kosher to keeping the sabbath seem to be on a pick and choose basis, which has always made me a little cynical about the choice to pay lip service to Leviticus only where homosexuality is concerned.
  - antgiant 8y ago
    There is nothing in the Bible to change the day from Sabbath to Sunday. As others have already noticed that happened literally hundreds of years later. As for homosexuality that is actually specificity mentioned several times in the New Testament. It is one of the very few Levitical laws expressly mentioned as still in force in the New Testament. However, in fairness those same passages also call out those who are adulterous, slanderous, greedy, and drunkards with equal force. 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 (NIV) 9 Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.
    - gotocake 8y ago
      Yeah, that’s a far cry from telling people to stone them to death, drop a wall on them, or some other nonsense. “You’re not going to heaven” is a nasty thing to say to someone, but it’s a long way from roadhauling them or denying them employment. Having said that I do find myself intrigued at the notion of Christians making cholent and employing a Shabbas goy.
    - 8y ago
whiddershins 8y ago
Isn’t there some sort of religious discrimination potential if your employer refuses to accommodate a limited concession that doesn’t preclude you fulfilling your duties? Or some such?
jtmcmc 8y ago
having on call responsibilities and being available 24/7 are significantly different. On call is a structured rotation that is usually explicitly part of a job description.
- toomuchtodo 8y ago
  Unpaid work is unpaid work (wage theft), full stop. You're not paid for 40 hours and then "heh, you're on call outside of 9-5 for the next week, but that's what you're paid for". Call it what it is: wage theft.
  - jtmcmc 8y ago
    salaried software engineers (in california at least) are exempt employees and thus don't have to be paid overtime. I'm pretty sure if you are not an exempt salaried employee or you are hourly then you do in fact have to be paid for the time on call that you are actually working and if you are not that is in fact illegal and wage theft. Anecdotally I have a friend who works in IT that is on call and does get paid for all the time on call that he is working. as another response said on call can or can not be exploitative depending on how it's setup but that is a separate issue from whether it's wage theft.
    - bigiain 8y ago
      > Anecdotally I have a friend who works in IT that is on call and does get paid for all the time on call that he is working. That's actually very common, at least around here outside of the startup scene. There's usually a fixed amount for just being on call, plus an hourly rate (often higher than regular rate) for actually having to do anything. Last time I managed a team of on-call staff, they all got paid for 2hrs at their regular rate for each weekday and 4hrs for each weekend day they were on call (whether they got called or not), plus time and a half for every hour they worked (rounded up to a minimum of 1hr per incident, so three 5 minute "quick fixes" counted at 3hrs at time and a half, which on a weekend meant 7hrs additional pay). We tried to make sure everyone by default got a rotation of a week of weekdays, a single two day weekend, then a whole week of just office hours. They were free to negotiate swaps amongst themselves as needed (it there was not required payroll adjustment), and to request schedule adjustments as needed (mostly for when the change would need payroll to be informed). We ended up averaging fewer than 10% of on-call shifts getting paged. Everybody was happy enough with that arrangement - it was about as good as any on-call arrangement I've ever been part of.
daveFNbuck 8y ago
> they're rarely enforced in any meaningful sense Your church sometimes enforces its rules about what you do outside of church in a meaningful sense? How does that work?
- cdoxsey 8y ago
  Many churches practice church discipline, for example with the PCA: http://www.pcahistory.org/pca/3-443.html http://www.pcahistory.org/pca/3-443.html It mostly applies to leadership, but also members. Possible "censures" include: - Admonition (ie calling someone out for their behavior) - Suspension from Office (you have to stop being a deacon) - Suspension from the Sacraments (you can't take communion anymore) - Excommunication (you can no longer be a member of the church) In practice I have only ever seen it done publicly in 3 circumstances: 1) Someone in leadership committed adultery and has to step down 2) An elder was excommunicated after abandoning his wife and children, leaving the church, and pulling a "Leaving Las Vegas" to live a life of total debauchery 3) A church leader was suspended due to abuse of power Leadership cases are kind of obvious, because the damage they do can be so bad. I mean it's bad enough in a workplace, but it can be devastating in a Church environment, which functions a lot more like a family. The Presbyterian process might seem a bit overblown or silly, but I appreciate the care with which they take these issues. I think a culture of discipline is generally useful in a Church, at least when it comes to admonition and encouragement. Adultery, drunkenness, gossip, greed, anger, ... all of these things affect others, and church discipline is attempting to admit to that problem rather than simply ignoring it. When it's done in a loving, winsome way, it can be a good thing. I screw up all the time, sometimes without even realizing it, and being called out for it can help me do better. Though I also recognize disciple can be, and often is abused. It can really turn cultic fast, and I've seen that a little in some communities, especially when it focuses on minor, tangential issues (like the music you listen too, the way you dress, your politics, etc...) So to recap, in the PCA, I've only really seen it with leadership. In the OPC church I briefly attended, it was suggested that if you were unwilling to baptize your children, or made a habit of working on Sunday, you may not be able to join the church, since that was a clear and important teaching of the church and you would clearly be violating it, hence, discipline.
  - 8y ago
sublupo 8y ago
I guess you'll have to be in such a situation to find out. I have an ancestor who moved to America as an Orthodox Jew in the early 1900s. He would find work on Monday, and work until Friday. If the employer wouldn't let him take Saturday off, then he would quit and look for a new job. This cycle eventually stopped when he got hired by a seventh day Adventist.
pmarreck 8y ago
One of the (sorry, few, IMHO) secular ethical benefits of religious behavioral allowances is the "sacred weekend". The thing is, what if I claimed membership in a religion that only allowed me to work 3 days a week? ;)

hso1 8y ago

I really appreciate people with convictions. I can see that the Sabbath issue is important to you, I'd only like to point out that, if one is to take it seriously, it's important to realize Sabbath is, and always has been, Saturday, the seventh day of the week.

gotocake 8y ago
I can’t speak for Christian interpretations, but the Torah is very clear on this subject, and Saturday is Shabbat. Because of how Jewish law is structured that leads to it being from sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday. I’m also under the impression that Christians more or less don’t follow the original law, and that includes Shabbat. Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. As I said, what I don’t know about the daily practice of Christianity could fill volumes, but outside of some obvious cherry picking of Leviticus it seems that they have their own thing going. Certainly a whole host of laws from keeping kosher to keeping the sabbath seem to be on a pick and choose basis, which has always made me a little cynical about the choice to pay lip service to Leviticus only where homosexuality is concerned.
- antgiant 8y ago
  There is nothing in the Bible to change the day from Sabbath to Sunday. As others have already noticed that happened literally hundreds of years later. As for homosexuality that is actually specificity mentioned several times in the New Testament. It is one of the very few Levitical laws expressly mentioned as still in force in the New Testament. However, in fairness those same passages also call out those who are adulterous, slanderous, greedy, and drunkards with equal force. 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 (NIV) 9 Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.
  - gotocake 8y ago
    Yeah, that’s a far cry from telling people to stone them to death, drop a wall on them, or some other nonsense. “You’re not going to heaven” is a nasty thing to say to someone, but it’s a long way from roadhauling them or denying them employment. Having said that I do find myself intrigued at the notion of Christians making cholent and employing a Shabbas goy.
  - 8y ago

whiddershins 8y ago

Isn’t there some sort of religious discrimination potential if your employer refuses to accommodate a limited concession that doesn’t preclude you fulfilling your duties? Or some such?

jtmcmc 8y ago

having on call responsibilities and being available 24/7 are significantly different. On call is a structured rotation that is usually explicitly part of a job description.

toomuchtodo 8y ago
Unpaid work is unpaid work (wage theft), full stop. You're not paid for 40 hours and then "heh, you're on call outside of 9-5 for the next week, but that's what you're paid for". Call it what it is: wage theft.
- jtmcmc 8y ago
  salaried software engineers (in california at least) are exempt employees and thus don't have to be paid overtime. I'm pretty sure if you are not an exempt salaried employee or you are hourly then you do in fact have to be paid for the time on call that you are actually working and if you are not that is in fact illegal and wage theft. Anecdotally I have a friend who works in IT that is on call and does get paid for all the time on call that he is working. as another response said on call can or can not be exploitative depending on how it's setup but that is a separate issue from whether it's wage theft.
  - bigiain 8y ago
    > Anecdotally I have a friend who works in IT that is on call and does get paid for all the time on call that he is working. That's actually very common, at least around here outside of the startup scene. There's usually a fixed amount for just being on call, plus an hourly rate (often higher than regular rate) for actually having to do anything. Last time I managed a team of on-call staff, they all got paid for 2hrs at their regular rate for each weekday and 4hrs for each weekend day they were on call (whether they got called or not), plus time and a half for every hour they worked (rounded up to a minimum of 1hr per incident, so three 5 minute "quick fixes" counted at 3hrs at time and a half, which on a weekend meant 7hrs additional pay). We tried to make sure everyone by default got a rotation of a week of weekdays, a single two day weekend, then a whole week of just office hours. They were free to negotiate swaps amongst themselves as needed (it there was not required payroll adjustment), and to request schedule adjustments as needed (mostly for when the change would need payroll to be informed). We ended up averaging fewer than 10% of on-call shifts getting paged. Everybody was happy enough with that arrangement - it was about as good as any on-call arrangement I've ever been part of.

daveFNbuck 8y ago

> they're rarely enforced in any meaningful sense Your church sometimes enforces its rules about what you do outside of church in a meaningful sense? How does that work?

cdoxsey 8y ago
Many churches practice church discipline, for example with the PCA: http://www.pcahistory.org/pca/3-443.html http://www.pcahistory.org/pca/3-443.html It mostly applies to leadership, but also members. Possible "censures" include: - Admonition (ie calling someone out for their behavior) - Suspension from Office (you have to stop being a deacon) - Suspension from the Sacraments (you can't take communion anymore) - Excommunication (you can no longer be a member of the church) In practice I have only ever seen it done publicly in 3 circumstances: 1) Someone in leadership committed adultery and has to step down 2) An elder was excommunicated after abandoning his wife and children, leaving the church, and pulling a "Leaving Las Vegas" to live a life of total debauchery 3) A church leader was suspended due to abuse of power Leadership cases are kind of obvious, because the damage they do can be so bad. I mean it's bad enough in a workplace, but it can be devastating in a Church environment, which functions a lot more like a family. The Presbyterian process might seem a bit overblown or silly, but I appreciate the care with which they take these issues. I think a culture of discipline is generally useful in a Church, at least when it comes to admonition and encouragement. Adultery, drunkenness, gossip, greed, anger, ... all of these things affect others, and church discipline is attempting to admit to that problem rather than simply ignoring it. When it's done in a loving, winsome way, it can be a good thing. I screw up all the time, sometimes without even realizing it, and being called out for it can help me do better. Though I also recognize disciple can be, and often is abused. It can really turn cultic fast, and I've seen that a little in some communities, especially when it focuses on minor, tangential issues (like the music you listen too, the way you dress, your politics, etc...) So to recap, in the PCA, I've only really seen it with leadership. In the OPC church I briefly attended, it was suggested that if you were unwilling to baptize your children, or made a habit of working on Sunday, you may not be able to join the church, since that was a clear and important teaching of the church and you would clearly be violating it, hence, discipline.
- 8y ago

sublupo 8y ago

I guess you'll have to be in such a situation to find out. I have an ancestor who moved to America as an Orthodox Jew in the early 1900s. He would find work on Monday, and work until Friday. If the employer wouldn't let him take Saturday off, then he would quit and look for a new job. This cycle eventually stopped when he got hired by a seventh day Adventist.

pmarreck 8y ago

One of the (sorry, few, IMHO) secular ethical benefits of religious behavioral allowances is the "sacred weekend". The thing is, what if I claimed membership in a religion that only allowed me to work 3 days a week? ;)