By Will Hall, Baptist Message Executive Editor
NEW ORLEANS (LBM) – During April 4 arguments before the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans, the lawyer for the North American Mission Board, the domestic mission arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, argued that the strategic partnership agreement (SPA) it negotiates with a state convention establishes an “ecclesiastical” governance for the two parties.
The claim was part of the latest development in the seven-year legal battle by Will McRaney against NAMB for its alleged defamation and tortious influence that led to his termination as executive director of the Baptist Convention of Maryland/Delaware.
ARGUMENTS
During the 43-minute oral presentations before the Court, lawyers for both parties made multiple points and responded to pointed questioning by the justices. However, each attorney tightly focused on his respective legal position.
NAMB’s lawyer claimed that that the Court did not have jurisdiction in the matter because of “ecclesiastical abstention” (a legal precedent that prevents courts from deciding matters of faith such as religious doctrine) and “ministerial exception” (the legal principle which prevents a court from interfering in issues between a religious institution and its ministers).
Moreover, he insisted that the SPA created a new association or organization composed of the two parties, explaining that “religious autonomy extends not only to churches but also to religious organizations of all sorts, and what the Watson Court makes clear is that if you as an individual choose to ‘unite’ with a ‘voluntary religious organization-er-association,’ you are deemed to have impliedly consented to that association’s governance.”
In other words, according to NAMB, the state convention no longer enjoys its own autonomy in this relationship but is now part of a joint autonomy with NAMB.
The SPA, he offered, made the issue “fundamentally a governance question because it is a governance document governing a voluntary religious association … . It would require theological determinations in order to interpret.”
— The principle of “ecclesiastical abstention” was established by the U.S. Supreme Court in its ruling in Watson v. Jones in 1871.
— In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court established the “ministerial exception” principle, ruling in Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. EEOC that the First Amendment protected religious institutions in employment decisions about “ministers.” Then in 2020 (Our Lady of Guadalupe School v. Morrisey-Berru), it broadened the legal concept to apply to teachers who engage in religious instruction at religious schools.
Meanwhile, McRaney’s lawyer cited Watson v. Jones to support his position that “there are no ecclesiastical questions to be decided at all, purely or not, but surely not ‘strictly and purely,’ which is the language that, I think, originated in Watson and then made its way into this Court’s decision in McRaney One” [a reference to the first time this court ruled on the case, favoring McRaney, in 2020].
“This is not an ecclesiastical dispute nor is it an internal church dispute or a ministry dispute,” he added.
“If you look at the actual allegations, this is a case about garden variety tortious conduct, and Dr. McRaney should be entitled to pursue his claims,” he offered in rebuttal.
— Watson v. Jones established that courts must recognize denominational authority to determine ecclesiastical matters among hierarchical churches, and that they must honor majority votes by members or officers of congregational or independent churches. However, the ruling also allows a court which is confronted with a church property dispute to simply apply “neutral principles of law, developed for use in all property disputes,” if doctrinal issues are not involved.
TIMELINE
2017
McRaney filed his lawsuit in April alleging that NAMB had interfered with his employment with the BCMD resulting in his 2015 termination, and afterward when he tried to secure other employment opportunities, NAMB blackballed him among Southern Baptist pastors.
2018
The case was heard by Senior Judge Glen H. Davidson in the U.S. District Court for the Northern Mississippi District who ruled in January that the federal lawsuit could proceed, finding that “McRaney was indisputably not employed by NAMB … and thus the ministerial exception does not apply to mandate dismissal of any of McRaney’s claims.”
“[O]n the face of the complaint, the Court can adjudicate this claim without delving into impermissible religious inquiries … and NAMB’s motion to dismiss this claim on this basis is denied,” he ordered.
2019
Then, prior to depositions and the hearing of evidence, Davidson made an unexpected reversal in April, dismissing the case on procedural grounds and not the facts. He declared that upon additional review the case would require the court to decide whether McRaney’s BCMD termination “was for a secular or religious purpose” and whether NAMB “had a valid religious reason” for its actions, something “the court cannot do.”
2020
In July a panel of three judges of the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals voted unanimously to overrule Davidson, stating that he had ended the lawsuit prematurely while “many of the relevant facts have yet to be developed.” Furthermore, they directed Davidson to “determine (1) whether NAMB intentionally and maliciously damaged McRaney’s business relationships by falsely claiming that he refused to meet with Ezell, … (2) whether NAMB’s statements about McRaney were false, defamatory, and at least negligently made, …; and (3) whether NAMB intentionally caused McRaney to suffer foreseeable and severe emotional distress by displaying his picture at its headquarters … .”
When NAMB appealed to the full court, the complete bench rebuffed NAMB 9-8, and upheld the panel’s view that McRaney’s “complaint asks the court to apply neutral principles of tort law to a case that, on the face of the complaint, involves a civil rather than religious dispute.”
2021
The U.S. Supreme Court lent support to McRaney’s case in June by rejecting NAMB’s request for these nine justices to review the 5th Circuit Court’s verdict, thus sending the lawsuit back to Judge Davidson in the U.S. District Court for the Northern Mississippi District.
2022
In February Davidson rejected NAMB’s petition for a summary judgment, thereby allowing evidence to be introduced and sworn depositions to proceed, and both sides subjected each other to on-the-record interviews.
2023
Just weeks before the September trial was set to begin, Davidson, again, dismissed McRaney’s lawsuit, repeating his previous conclusion that “the Plaintiff’s claims in this lawsuit will clearly require the Court to inquire into religious matters and decision-making to a degree that is simply impermissible under the Constitution and the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine.”
McRaney responded in October by filing another appeal to the 5th Circuit.
Additionally, 62 Southern Baptist leaders filed an amicus brief in November that expressed support for McRaney. Likewise, the filing added to the discussion about the Baptist polity of autonomy, a concept that had been misinterpreted for the Court in an amicus brief submitted by the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, which had falsely claimed that the Southern Baptist Convention is “the umbrella Southern Baptist governing body over all the various groups of churches.”
ADDITIONAL CONTEXT
The three-judge panel for the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals comprises:
— Chief Judge Priscilla Richman (69), who was appointed by former President George W. Bush and is a graduate of Baylor University (bachelor’s degree) and Baylor University School of Law (Juris Doctor).
— Judge Andrew Stephen Oldham (45), who was appointed by former President Donald J. Trump and is a graduate of Harvard University (bachelor’s degree), University of Cambridge, England (master’s degree), and University of Virginia (Juris Doctor).
— Judge Irma Carrillo Ramirez (60), who was appointed by President Joe Biden and is a graduate of West Texas A&M University (bachelor’s degree) and Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law (Juris Doctor).
McRaney is represented by Scott E. Gant, a partner with Boies-Schiller-Flexner, which was identified as “liberal” in its corporate ideology among 350 large American law firms in a list published by Harvard Law School. He practices the faith tradition of Reform Judaism, also known as Liberal Judaism or Progressive Judaism.
NAMB is represented by Matthew T. Martens, a partner with Wilmer-Cutler-Pickering-Hale and Dorr, which was cited as the “most-liberal among the nation’s largest law firms” by law360.com and named “Visionary National Legal Partner” by the National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce. He is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention as well as The Gospel Coalition, a denomination-like organization that identifies itself as “a fellowship of evangelical churches of the Reformed tradition.”
