Swift agrees to Muslims' demands for prayer times
Chad Groening - OneNewsNow - 9/18/2008 10:10:00 AM
Earlier this week 300 Muslims walked off the job at a JBS Swift & Company meatpacking facility in Grand Island, Nebraska, and marched on city hall, complaining that they were denied time to pray at sunset during their month of Ramadan. But two days later the union announced that the company agreed to accommodate the Muslims' demands. (Read about the latest development in this matter)
On Wednesday the president of the local United Food and Commercial Workers Union said management at the Nebraska plant had agreed to temporarily change the timing of the second-shift lunch break to accommodate workers wanting time to pray at sunset during the Muslim observance of Ramadan. The company says the arrangement will be in effect for the remainder of Ramadan -- through the end of this month.
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Jan Markell, founder and director of Minnesota-based Olive Tree Ministries, says this is not the first time Muslims have foisted their religious demands on private companies.
"We have had a little bit of this experience in my home state of Minnesota, [at] the Hormel plant in Austin...," she shares. "The exact same problem took place down there. And not only that, this is going on all over the country. This is not localized to just one or two or three meatpacking plants." In fact, a similar incident happened recently at a Swift plant in Greeley, Colorado.
Markell laments that some groups of Muslims are demanding that others accommodate their ways. "They're trying to set a trend here where their wishes and their holidays and their prayer time will be absolutely not only acknowledged but honored," says Markell. "I believe that when anybody comes [to America] from another nation legally they really need to assimilate into our culture."
Markell says it is unfortunate in this age of political correctness that immigrants to the United States do not have to become American citizens.
