Christians urged to defy non-existent cross ban

Cardinal Keith O'Brien has used his guaranteed free press at Easter to urge all Christians to wear a cross at work, in protest at what he sees as the "marginalisation" of religion.  This presumably follows an obscure government submission to a silly case in the European Court of Human Rights last week, which seems to have been taken as a "ban" on wearing crosses.

Let's be clear - there is no law against wearing crosses at work, but employers can and do set dress codes, which may include banning jewellery.  This has long been the case, and has nothing whatever to do with religion.

If you cut through all the usual nonsense about how those nasty militant secularists are trying to destroy christianity, the facts are these (more detail here) :

• Nadia Eweida and Shirley Chaplin are both Christians who worked in places where necklaces were not allowed.
• They insisted on wearing crucifixes around their necks anyway, and lost out at work as a result
• They both took their employers to court claiming discrimination and lost
• They are now taking their case to the European Court of Human Rights, claiming that it is their inalienable human right to wear a cross, and that UK law must be changed to accommodate this.
• The government says they have no such right.

What we actually have here are two cases where people have chosen to work in places which place restrictions on what they can wear.  They've then decided that because they are christians, the rules which apply to everybody else needn't apply to them.

There is no secular conspiracy to stop people wearing their crosses, or for that matter their turbans, burkhas or indeed offensive atheist t-shirts!  All the government is saying is that if an employer makes a rule about clothing in the workplace, it applies to everyone equally.