Religious Liberty Bars Priest’s Defamation Claim Against Bishop, Virginia Court Rules

A priest’s defamation claim against his bishop is barred by the religious liberty protections in the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and the Virginia Constitution, a Virginia appeals court has ruled.

The Virginia Court of Appeals found that the “ecclesiastical- abstention doctrine” inspired by these religious liberties guarantees decision-making autonomy for religious organizations in matters involving the discipline of clergy and other matters. In effect, secular civil courts are prohibited from getting involved in or resolving ecclesiastical disputes.

The case involved a claim for defamation filed by a defrocked Episcopal priest against the diocesan bishop who deposed him from the ministry.

The ruling reversed a lower district court that said the ecclesiastical- abstention doctrine (also called the church autonomy doctrine) did not apply because the defamation claim could be resolved through a secular inquiry that need not delve into religious matters. The same lower court dismissed intentional tort claims against the bishop and church as barred under the doctrine but it left the defamation claim to be handled by the court.

The appeals court said the district court erred. It found the defamation claim also was beyond the court’s reach because it is “so intertwined with the bishop’s deposing him as a priest” that the claim cannot be litigated without entangling the court in a religious dispute.

“When a priest who has been fired sues the church and its leadership raising tort claims that cannot be unscrambled from the church’s decision to fire him, the First Amendment has struck the balance for us,” the appeals court stated.

The case involved Robert K. Marshall, a former Episcopal priest, who sued the Episcopal Church, the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Virginia, and the Right Reverend Susan B. Haynes.

Marshall’s defamation count alleged that Haynes committed defamation in May 2022 when she told the congregation that Marshall had engaged in sexual misconduct and that he had admitted as much. She said he admitted to “behaviors that crossed the line of what is appropriate between a priest and a parishioner or staff person.”

Shortly thereafter, Marshall was defrocked.

Marshall claimed the bishop falsely stated that an investigator ‘s report had “determined that the allegations had merit.” He also maintained he never admitted to improper conduct as the bishop stated.

The appeals court acknowledged that a secular court may adjudicate controversies arising in religious settings if it can do so based on “neutral principles of law” that are “completely secular in operation” as the state Supreme Court did in a 2006 opinion, Bowie v. Murphy.

Bowie was a church deacon whom the pastor and several church officials dismissed after accusing him of assault. The court noted that Bowie had pleaded his defamation claim narrowly to avoid ecclesiastical questions. As a result, the alleged defamatory statements could be evaluated “for their veracity and the impact they had on Bowie’s reputation the same as if the statements were made in any other, non-religious context… separate and apart from the church governance issue involved in Bowie’s status as a deacon.”

In the current case, the appeals court concluded that such a “neutral” approach was not possible because determining the truth of whether Marshall’s conduct “crossed the line of what is appropriate” for a priest would require interpreting the canons of the Episcopal Church, thereby “entangling the court in a religious question.”

Topics Legislation Virginia