Celebrity or religion: is Prada your demigod?

05/11: Celebrity or religion: is Prada your demigod? My eldest daughter, through no influence from me or the family, decided about a year ago to become an Anglican. At the time she was attending the McDonald College of the Performing Arts, a school once attended by TV host Sarah Murdoch and pop star Nikki Webster.

Charlotte is around the ‘celebrity or religion’ issues daily and finding that her belief system is already influencing her behaviour.

Take this story for example. Charlotte seemed perturbed when she came home one day after a hip church youth group meeting. "Mum," she said, "I've just found out we're not supposed to have sex before marriage." Hesitatingly, I asked her, "Well darling, how do you feel about that?" And she responded with the classic, "Well, I'm just going to have to get married very young!" Go Charlotte!

Religion sparked an interesting conversation with my daughter that included some significant behavioural consequences. Of course, there's no reason why you can't follow both religion and celebrity culture, but celebrities are probably discussed more in the workplace than religion and yet religious beliefs will almost certainly have more of a behavioural affect!

The reality for the workplace is, we are a country where the majority of us live above the poverty line, where celebrities are revered and possessions are relatively easy to come by, for many. But we also live in a country where 64 percent of Australians identify themselves as Christian.

However, staggeringly, one-third of employers have seen clashes in the workplace about religion, which must slow productivity, lower morale and affect company culture. So what's happening? Are we shy of talking about our religious views? Or asking others theirs? Is there a lack of understanding and tolerance or a fear of causing offence?

I work successfully with Sikhs, Greek Orthodox, Catholics, Anglicans, agnostics and a few free spirits. I love hearing about our differing views and more importantly what we have in common in the office — it creates great discussion and some laughs.

But for many businesses this is not the case — religion is sensitive, not spoken about or pushed under the carpet and intolerance permeates. Is this because religious beliefs have a direct effect on behaviour in the workplace, in life and at home? I believe they do. But should religion create discussion? I think it's healthy to put it out on the table.

This is all front of mind for me because apart from Charlotte's question, Jesus and faith have been talked about a lot in my office this week. Our work on the Bible Society's "Jesus. All About Life" campaign won an award from the Public Relations Institute of Australia on Monday. I was interviewed on Hope 103.2, a Sydney-based Christian radio station, about the win and tonight another interview with the Australian Christian Channel will be broadcast on Foxtel.

Inevitably, I get asked about my own faith and yes, it's taken me right out of my comfort zone. I'm being asked about my faith and having to talk about it in reference to a client campaign. This is not always comfortable for me and not always what one expects to be asked in the workforce. But I've come to terms with it and it's good. I am, after all, an individual before I am a business owner or a public relations practitioner.

But how else does faith get raised as an issue in the workplace? Yesterday I signed a new client and much of our future work for them will be based around the unfolding of opportunities based around shared core values. While these core values are not strictly religious, they are based firmly around trust and respect. I think this is another point. Because, on a daily basis at the core of successful relationships — business, supplier or personal — exist a joint set of shared core values to make things work well. After all, religion sets, dictates and encourages core values and modes of behaviour.

I believe we need more open discussion. We can as, employers make our views clear on religion in the workplace and encourage our teams to do so too, so we create the opportunity for settled atmospheres of tolerance and understanding or constructive agreements to differ.

The debate in my multinational, multiracial office has sparked some good, meaty discussion. We've talked about hypocrisy, religious days off, tolerance, celebrities and their fashionable religious choices, adherence to Prada rather than religious teachings, the controversies over The Da Vinci Code and The Passion of the Christ, the wearing of burqas and human rights issues. And so on.

Is our debate isolated? Is it something that should be legislated? At the moment religious freedom is safeguarded by section 116 of the Australian Constitution. This constitutional right protects us from the federal government from establishing any religion, imposing any religious observance or prohibiting the free exercise of any religion. Therefore by law individuals are free to express a diversity of views, as long as they do not incite any element of religious hatred.

While I might meet my future son-in-law a lot earlier than I expected, what's going on in your workplace with reference to religious discussion? God willing, my team and I will continue to use it positively in our office.

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