Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, DISCRIMINATION—RELIGIOUS—Mass. App.: Healthcare worker’s suit against health system over COVID-19 vaccination policy reinstated, (Oct 10, 2025)

By Brian Craig, J.D.

The employee’s beliefs not to receive the COVID-19 vaccination were beliefs that a trier of fact could determine were religious in nature.

Finding that a jury could reasonably conclude that a healthcare worker’s beliefs not to receive the COVID-19 vaccination were religious in nature, the Massachusetts Appeals Court has reinstated a case brought against UMass Memorial Health Care System. The appeals court reversed the decision of the trial court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of the health system and held that the healthcare worker’s beliefs that her body is a temple of God and that she prayed to God and received a message not to receive the COVID-19 vaccination were religious in nature. The appeals court also found the health system failed to show any evidence of an undue burden in providing accommodation for the worker (Jeune v. UMass Memorial Health Care System, No. 24-P-1047 (Mass. App. Sept. 29, 2025)).

A healthcare worker filed request a religious exemption after her employer, UMass Memorial Health Care System, adopted a systemwide COVID-19 vaccination policy. The woman worked as a certified surgical tech operating room. The healthcare worker stated beliefs that her body is a temple of God and that she prayed to God and received a message not to receive the COVID-19 vaccination. The health system denied the worker a religious exemption from its COVID-19 vaccination policy on the ground that her beliefs relied on demonstrably false information. The denial stated that the employee’s assertion that she cannot receive the COVID-19 vaccines based on ger Christian faith because she will genetically alter' their body. The employee was then terminated for failing to receive the COVID-19 vaccines and failure to obtain a religious exemption. The healthcare worker filed suit against the health system in Massachusetts state court alleging religious discrimination in violation of Massachusetts state law. The trial court granted the health system’s motion for summary judgment. The healthcare worker appealed.

Religious belief. The appeals court held that the employee met her burden in showing a sincerely held religious belief. Under Massachusetts law, initially, the employee bears the burden of proving that the employer required the employee to violate a religious practice compelled by the employee’s sincerely held belief. Here, the healthcare worker expressed the belief that her “body is the temple of Go”" and that the vaccines contain proteins that are not natural to human genetic system. She stated that she consulted the Bible and prayed to God and that her refusal was a “distinctive message from my God.”

The appeals court found that a person who believes that she was created in God’s image and that her body is a temple of God and thus needs God’s approval to expose her body to foreign substances, expresses a religious belief. Moreover, an employee who prays to God and receives a “distinctive message from my God” acts in accordance with religious beliefs when she follows those divine instructions. Therefore, the employee demonstrated evidence of a sincerely held religious belief.

Undue burden. Furthermore, the appeals court concluded that the health system failed to show an undue burden in providing accommodation for the worker. If the employee meets the initial burden of proving that the employer required the employee to violate a religious practice compelled by the employee’s sincerely held belief, the burden then shifts to the employer to prove that accommodation of the employee’s religious obligations would impose an undue hardship.

In this case, the health system’s policy was to offer accommodations for employees’ religious beliefs, which strongly suggests that it can do so without undue hardship. Second, the employee testified that three other hospitals had accommodated her not receiving the influenza vaccine. Third, and most importantly, the appeals court found the health system simply failed to provide any evidence of undue hardship. The health system argued that it would suffer reputational harm if workers did not receive the COVID-19 vaccine. But a claim that an accommodation would hurt an employer’s public image is inadequate to show an undue hardship without proof that the employer would suffer concrete harm.

One accommodation listed in the health system’s policy is transfer to another job within the hospital, if available. But the health system provided no evidence, or even an assertion, that no other jobs were available for the worker in this case. Because the appeals court found a genuine issue of material fact regarding whether accommodating the employee’s religious beliefs would cause an undue hardship to the health system, the court reversed the grant of summary judgment in favor of the health system and reinstated the case.

The case is No. 24-P-1047.

Attorneys: Scott A. Lathrop (Law Offices of Scott A. Lathrop) for Rachelle Jeune. Robert L. Kilroy (Mirick, O’Connell, Demallie & Lougee, LLP) for UMass Memorial Health Care System.

Companies: UMass Memorial Health Care System

Cases: ReligiousDiscrimination Discharge Covid19 StateLawClaims MassachusettsNews