Higher Callings

Angie Tracey's inspiration came suddenly. "God just spoke to my heart," she says. The message from above? Start a prayer group at the office.

Tracey works in HIV/AIDS prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. She knew of no other prayer groups in federal agencies. But creating the Christian Fellowship Group-an officially recognized employee association at CDC-was so easy that Tracey sees only one explanation. "When God has a plan, it's not going to be thwarted," she says.

Tracey received permission from CDC officials to create the group in September 2001. More than 200 people attended the first meeting, and the group now has at least 400 members. They broadcast messages via CDC e-mail. They have a Web site on the agency's intranet. They meet in agency conference rooms for lunch-hour prayer and Bible study several times a month and hold quarterly events off site.

The private sector has seen an explosion of interest in religion at work, especially in the past 10 years. Christian business seminars and networking groups abound. Titles such as God Is My CEO (Adams Media Corp., 2001), Lead Like Jesus (J. Countryman, 2003) and Anointed for Business (Regal Books, 2002) line the business sections in bookstores. Magazines such as Fortune, BusinessWeek and Inc. have documented the trend. Proponents claim that bringing religion to work boosts productivity and slows turnover. And since people spend more time at work than ever, some say the desire to share religion with colleagues is natural. "The neighborhood of today is the workplace," says Kent Humphries, president of the Fellowship of Companies for Christ International, a network of Christian business leaders.

In government, guidelines for religious expression in the federal workplace issued by the Clinton White House in 1997 opened the door for worship at work. The rules, which were the first of their kind, gave workers lots of leeway for practicing their faith. "Employees should be permitted to engage in religious expression with fellow employees to the same extent that they may engage in comparable nonreligious private expression," the guidelines state. Since they were issued, groups have met for prayer on an informal basis at the General Services Administration, Health and Human Services Department, Office of Personnel Management and other federal agencies.

The guidelines also addressed proselytizing, workplace accommodations and expressions of faith in work areas. Federal employees may wear crosses around their necks, keep the Koran on their desks or hang the Ten Commandments in their cubicles-provided religion does not get in the way of their work or create the impression that the religious expressions are sponsored by the government. Federal workers may even attempt to convert co-workers to their own beliefs, though they must stop when asked.

At CDC, the Christian Fellowship Group follows the same rules as other employee associations, such as CDC's Association of Professional Women and the Federal Managers Association. But unlike those other associations, the Christian Fellowship Group meets to talk about Jesus-a topic that once was taboo in the federal workplace and that continues to make some employees feel ill at ease. Tracey has received "a handful" of e-mails from co-workers expressing concern about her group. "I try to answer them with compassion," Tracey says, and she often extends an invitation to the group's meetings.

Tracey and others feel strongly the need to make religion a part of their work lives. "I see it as a diversity issue," she says. "We are a culturally diverse workplace in the federal government, and yet for whatever reason, people of faith have felt that it was not a safe place for them to share their faith, discuss their faith and be who they are culturally." Before her group was founded, Tracey says, workers hid Bibles in drawers. When they talked about religion, they whispered.

But Laura Nash, a senior lecturer at Harvard Business School and the author of Church on Sunday, Work on Monday: The Challenge of Fusing Christian Values with Business Life (Jossey-Bass, 2001), says even the best-intentioned prayer groups can alienate some people. "It's like the CEO who takes up golf, and all of a sudden everyone's golfing," she says. "It looks harmless until you look around the room and see the handicapped person who can't play." Members of faiths other than Christianity can form groups too, of course. CDC now has an association for followers of Baha'i, a religion based on equality and unity.

The Rev. Barry Lynn, who is the executive director of a religious freedom watchdog group based in Washington called Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, says he's gotten calls from Justice Department employees who feel pressured by daily Bible study meetings led by Attorney General John Ashcroft. So far, though, none have taken action. "There's a tremendous disincentive, if your boss is the attorney general, to go file some workplace discrimination claim," Lynn says. Ashcroft aides have said the meetings are voluntary, and that members of other religious groups are welcome.