> ## Content Index
> Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.theredlighthouse.org/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further.

# Everyone Will Tell You the Second Circuit Just Made Religious Accommodation Harder. Read Bergin. It Moved the Question From What Your Boss Knew to What Your Boss Wanted.
- URL: https://www.theredlighthouse.org/advocate-bergin-motive-not-notice/
- Published: 2026-09-01T16:50:26.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-01T16:50:26.000Z
- Description: The Second Circuit replaced notice with motive. That reads as a loss, and for one court officer it was. For the employee who never filed a form, it is the opposite.
- Author: The Red Lighthouse
- Tags: The Advocate, News Stories

Strip the case to its principle and it is not complicated. Title VII has always required your employer to accommodate your religious practice unless doing so imposes an undue hardship. The fight has never been about that sentence. It has been about what you must prove first, before anyone asks whether accommodating you was hard.

On July 15, 2026, the Second Circuit changed that first step for every employer and every employee in New York, Connecticut and Vermont. The case is *Bergin v. New York State Unified Court System*, and the plaintiff lost this round.

That is the part the summaries lead with. It is also the least interesting thing about the ruling.

Start with the old test, because that is where the panic lives. For decades a plaintiff in the Second Circuit made out an initial religious accommodation claim by showing three things: that she held a bona fide religious belief conflicting with an employment requirement, that she informed her employer of that belief, and that she was disciplined for failing to comply. Notice the middle element. It made your employer’s knowledge the hinge.

*Bergin* holds that element did not survive *EEOC v. Abercrombie & Fitch Stores, Inc.*, decided in 2015\. There the Court considered a retailer that declined to hire a Muslim applicant wearing a headscarf, and held that Title VII asks about motive, not knowledge. An employer who acts with the motive of avoiding an accommodation violates the statute whether or not it knew one was required.

The Second Circuit had gone on applying its own three part test anyway. *Bergin* says that is over. A plaintiff must now show that she actually required an accommodation of a religious practice, and that her employer’s desire to avoid that accommodation was a motivating factor in an adverse employment decision. The panel also held that *Abercrombie*’s standard reaches terminations, not only hiring.

The facts are worth having straight. Bergin was a New York court officer. She sought a religious exemption from her employer’s COVID-19 vaccination requirement, submitting a personal statement, Scripture, and a letter from her pastor addressing fetal stem cell lines used in vaccine development. Her employer sent a supplemental form asking about her past use of vaccines and other medications. She returned it with most questions unanswered, citing medical privacy. The exemption was denied. A week before her deadline she submitted the completed form, the employer said its decision was final, and she was terminated. The requirement was later rescinded and she was reinstated. The lawsuit went on.

The district court granted her partial summary judgment on the initial elements under the old test, treating the employer’s interrogatory answers and deposition testimony as binding admissions that her application had shown a sincere religious belief. The Second Circuit vacated and remanded on both points. Read in context, it held, those statements did not resolve the sincerity dispute, because the employer had also said its review committee wanted more information before it could evaluate sincerity.

Here is the turn. Everyone will file this as a defeat for religious employees, and for Bergin herself, on remand, it may be. But look at what the new test does for the employee who is not Bergin.

A formal request is no longer required. If an employer suspects that a worker will need a religious accommodation and moves to avoid providing one, the absence of a written request does not defeat the claim. Most people who need Saturday off, or a beard, or a headscarf, never file anything. They read the room and they comply and they say nothing, and under the old test their silence was very close to fatal. *Bergin* makes the employer’s reason the question, which is where it belonged.

It also gives employers a genuine defense, which is the fair point to concede. An employer who denies a request because it honestly believed it lacked the information to evaluate a stated belief has denied it for a reason other than avoiding accommodation. That distinction is what sent this case back down. It also invites the endless follow-up questionnaire, and courts will have to police the line between a question that addresses a real uncertainty and one designed to exhaust.

The pluralist point cuts our way. The standard that will eventually protect the court officer who quoted Scripture about fetal cell lines is the same standard that protects the Sikh routed quietly away from customer facing work, the Muslim warehouse worker who never filled out a form, and the Seventh-day Adventist whose manager stopped scheduling her rather than argue about Saturdays. A liberty that runs on paperwork protects the confident. A liberty that runs on motive protects everyone else.

So: ask, in writing, and keep a copy. *Bergin* does not require the request, but a request is evidence, and evidence is what motive cases run on. If you run a ministry, a school or a business, write down the real reason for every accommodation decision at the time you make it. The whole case turned on what the employer said its reason was and when it said it.

And keep the boundary honest. *Bergin* binds three states. Other circuits have their own formulations, and this is now a split worth watching, because the Supreme Court has shown in *Abercrombie* and again in *Groff v. DeJoy* that it will take these cases.

If this is the kind of reading you want in your inbox, the careful kind that starts with the holding instead of the headline, our members are the reason it exists. Share it with someone who needs it.

## Sources

- Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, “Second Circuit Revises Prima Facie Test for Title VII Religious-Accommodation Claims,” August 10, 2026\. [sullcrom.com](https://www.sullcrom.com/insights/blogs/2026/August/Second-Circuit-Revises-Prima-Facie-Test-Title-VII-ReligiousAccommodation-Claims?ref=theredlighthouse.org)
- *Bergin v. New York State Unified Court System*, Second Circuit, decided July 15, 2026\. [Opinion on CourtListener](https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/10928236/bergin-v-ny-state-unified-court-system/?ref=theredlighthouse.org)
- Eric B. Meyer, The Employer Handbook, “A Religious Accommodation Claim Requires More Than a Request and a Denial,” August 25, 2026\. [theemployerhandbook.com](https://www.theemployerhandbook.com/a-religious-accommodation-claim-requires-more-than-a-request-and-a-denial/?ref=theredlighthouse.org)
- Ogletree Deakins, “Second Circuit Clarifies Standard for Religious Discrimination Claims.” [ogletree.com](https://ogletree.com/insights-resources/blog-posts/second-circuit-clarifies-standard-for-religious-discrimination-claims/?ref=theredlighthouse.org)
- *EEOC v. Abercrombie & Fitch Stores, Inc.*, 575 U.S. 768 (2015). [supreme.justia.com](https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/575/768/?ref=theredlighthouse.org)