Worker fired after posting picture of Jesus

A call center employee says he has been dismissed from his job for posting an artist's rendition of the crucifixion during Easter week, even though other employees were allowed to post pictures and art as they chose in their cubicles.

Chris Romansky, a former employee of Barclays, told WND he was told there had been a complaint about the picture he put up to remind himself of Christ's sacrifice on the cross, a foundational belief in Christianity.

A company spokeswoman, Donna Sokolsky, told WND that the job termination "had nothing to do with anything religious whatsoever." But she said she was not permitted by human resources to know "more beyond that."

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"What I CAN tell you is that Barclays has very strict policies around nondescrimination (sic), especially religious. I cannot speak for this particular individual's situation but I know that there was no religious descrimination. I do not think you have a story here."

She followed up several days later with a formal, unattributed statement, "We do not discriminate or take any action based on religious affiliation."

Barclays PLC, according to Sokolsky, is a large global financial service provider, offering banking, investment banking and investment management services. It operates in more than 60 countries and has 110,500 employees worldwide.

Romansky told WND his dismissal was effective April 13, and he has contacted state labor regulators about filing a complaint.

"We're actually allowed to hang up pictures on our cubes. I had a picture of my wife, and there's a cross in the background but that didn't seem to bother anybody," he said. He also had posted a couple of Internet clippings, but those generated no response either.

Then during the Easter season, he said, "I hung a picture of the crucifixion, actually it was before Easter. It was of the crucifixion of Jesus and it showed the Resurrection and it said 'Happy Easter.'"

"I came in on the following Tuesday, and it was face down on my desk, so I put it back up," he said. Then a team manager came and told him there had been a complaint that it was "offensive" and he had to take it back down.

The manager called him into her office. "She told me people were offended, and she told me anything with Jesus and God can't be up," Romansky told WND.

The manager told him to leave the building. "She took copies of the pictures," he said.

Several conversations with managers and the human resources department followed, Romansky said.

"She [the manager] then called me and told me they're going to have to let me go," he said. He said he'd never even been "corrected" before by the company, and she responded that he was being dismissed for insubordination.

"I said I want [copies of] all the corrective actions. I want an explanation," he said.

He said the "complaint" about his Easter picture may have been in retaliation, because earlier he had complained about the crudity of the conversation in the office.

"I feel I was singled out," he said.

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