Rather than do/doing

[aachu]

Which of the following sentences is correct? If both are correct, whats the difference between their meanings?
1. Rather than firing the staff members church leaders followed a policy of..

2. Rather than fire staff members church leaders followed a policy..

[aachu]

To put it another way, what does the verb preceded by 'Rather than' take? A bare infinitive or a gerund? If both are possible, when a bare infinitive and when a gerund?

[5jj]

Both are possible; there is no difference in meaning

[Rover_KE]

aachu (Bless you!), please note that you need three dots for an ellipsis, not two, and that you could have used the Edit Post feature to add your follow up question to your original post.

Rover