A California teacher, fired for exercising her religious beliefs, is suing her former employer Bright Horizons, a large international childcare program with over 500 locations in the U.S., for religious discrimination, harassment, and retaliation. Thomas More Society attorneys are representing Nelli Parisenkova, who worked at Bright Horizons Children’s Center in Studio City, California before being terminated for refusing to read children’s books promoting same-sex marriage to children ages 1-5 years old. Nelli has a sincerely held Christian belief that marriage is a sacred covenant of lifelong union between one man and one woman. When Nelli's employer discovered her religious beliefs, the manager enforced company policy requiring all teachers to support and promote celebrations of “diversity” including same-sex marriage to children in the care programs. When Nelli didn’t comply and requested an accommodation, her employer harassed her, escorted her out of the building with a security guard, and eventually fired her.

Parisenkova had served for four years as a support teacher, providing childcare for children aged 1 to 5. Around the time of her employment in April 2018, Parisenkova discovered that the childcare room in which she worked had children’s books on the shelf that promoted and celebrated same-sex relationships and marriage. The books included titles such as “Daddy, Papa, and Me” and “Mommy, Mama, and Me” and feature same sex-couple marriages and families. Because of her faith, Parisenkova believes that it would be sinful for her to personally promote any messages that are contrary to the Biblical teachings on marriage. Expressing her concern, Parisenkova was given by her Christian supervisor at the time an informal accommodation that she would not be required to read books to the children promoting same-sex marriage.

According to the lawsuit, four years later, in April 2022, the director of Bright Horizons’ Studio City location, Katy Callas, discovered Parisenkova’s religious beliefs in this regard and reported Parisenkova to the human resource department for violating company policy requiring all staff to celebrate and promote “diversity,” including same-sex marriage.

“Make sure you know what books are on the shelf in your children’s care programs and schools. This is a clear-cut case of one of the largest childcare employers in the country having anti-religious workplace policies that promote indoctrination of young children with the LGBT agenda,” declared attorney Paul Jonna, partner at LiMandri & Jonna LLP and Thomas More Society Special Counsel.

“Callas, who is lesbian, apparently took personal offense at Nelli Parisenkova’s religious beliefs and enforced Bright Horizons anti-religious ‘diversity and inclusion’ workplace policies,” explained Jonna. “Callas called Nelli into her office, questioned her in an irate manner, told her that if she did not want to celebrate diversity this was not the place for her to work, gave her an administrative leave memo, escorted her outside with a security guard, and left her out in the 96-degree heat with no transportation. As a result, Nelli was forced to walk 20 minutes in the heat and wait 45 minutes for transportation and suffered heat exhaustion for the next two days. She was afraid to return to work.”

The filed complaint details how Parisenkova then formally requested a religious accommodation from Bright Horizons and how Bright Horizons categorically rejected the request without considering alternate options such as having another co-worker read the offending books. As soon as Bright Horizons learned of Ms. Parisenkova’s religious objection, Bright Horizons was intent on creating a hostile work environment and forcing Parisenkova’s termination.

The lawsuit reads: “Bright Horizons responded by categorically denying the request. Bright Horizons did not engage in any negotiations and made no attempt whatsoever to determine whether a reasonable accommodation could be reached. Instead, Bright Horizons issued a counseling memo with false statements, terminated her life-insurance benefits, required her to complete retraining in diversity issues, and encouraged her to resign her position. Ms. Parisenkova could not return to work without an accommodation; so, Bright Horizons terminated her employment.”

“This is an outrageous example of religious discrimination,” added Jonna. “Nelli Parisenkova had been operating under the radar with an informal accommodation request for multiple years without notice. As soon as upper-level management discovered her religious beliefs and received her formal accommodation request, Bright Horizons leveled the full force of the company’s anti-religious and ironically ‘un-inclusive’ diversity policy against Ms. Parisenkova. They tried to get her to quit through harassment and intimidation. When she couldn’t return to work because they denied her accommodation request, they fired her. You can’t get much more discriminatory than that. It’s unethical and it’s blatantly illegal.”

Parisenkova and her attorney have brought seven counts of wrongdoing against Callas, the Bright Horizons Childcare Center, LLC (which is the largest child-care provider company in the United States), and unnamed and unknown individuals involved in the Bright Horizons decision making process, identified in the complaint as Does 1 - 20.

The seven causes of action enumerate violations of multiple governmental codes and public policy and include religious discrimination, failure to accommodate, wrongful termination, harassment based on religion, failure to prevent discrimination and harassment, retaliation, and constructive discharge.

Read the complaint filed October 13, 2022, by Thomas More Society attorneys on behalf of Nelli Parisenkova at the Superior Court of the State of California, County of Los Angeles – North Central in Nelli Parisenkova v. Bright Horizons Children’s Center, LLC, et al. here.