Professional Negligence Law Reporter

A Texas appellate court held that a diocese and its deacon were not liable to a parishioner-husband whose divorce allegedly resulted from his wife’s counseling sessions and personal relationship with the deacon.

Scott Mosby sued Deacon Edward Kleinguetl and the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, alleging negligence, negligent counseling, and other claims. The plaintiff asserted that Kleinguetl’s counseling sessions with his wife transitioned into a personal relationship that led to his divorce. The defendants filed pleas to the court’s jurisdiction, arguing that the plaintiff’s claims were barred by the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine. The trial court granted the pleas and dismissed the plaintiff’s claims.

Affirming, the appellate court noted that under the First Amendment, the government must not burden the free exercise of religion by encroaching on a church’s governance and its ability to manage its internal affairs. Citing case law, the court nevertheless found that churches are subject to rules governing torts, contracts, and criminal conduct.

The court found that the plaintiff’s allegations do not clearly intrude upon a religious matter or interfere with the archdiocese’s ability to manage its internal affairs. The allegations, the court said, concerned Kleinguetl’s personal relationship with the plaintiff’s former wife and a counseling relationship and therefore do not involve inherently ecclesiastical issues.

Nevertheless, the court noted that although the plaintiff had been afforded a reasonable opportunity to amend his pleadings to cure a jurisdictional defect, he still has failed to allege facts sufficient to establish jurisdiction and has not therefore defeated the defendants’ jurisdictional challenge. Consequently, the court held that the trial court had not erred in granting the defendants’ pleas to the jurisdiction.

Citation: Mosby v. Deacon Edward Kleinguetl, 2021 WL 824779 (Tex. App. Mar. 4, 2021).