In Brandenburg v. Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North America, (SD NY, Feb. 23, 2023), a New York federal district court held that it can proceed to adjudicate hostile work environment and some of the retaliation claims brought by two nuns against the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese and several of its clergy members. The nuns claimed that Father Makris, the school's director of student life and their "spiritual father" subjected them to unwanted sexual attention for 13 to 14 years. According to the court:
[T]he ministerial exception flows from the plaintiff’s status as a “minister.” In this case, however, Defendants’ argument has nothing to do with the fact that Plaintiffs were sanctified nuns; instead, it flows from Father Makris’s status as minister and the alleged rationale for his conduct....
These and other cases make plain that the First Amendment does not shield all decisions by religious institutions, whether or employment-related or otherwise, from review. Instead, a court is barred from adjudicating a dispute involving a religious institution “only where resolution of the dispute will require the Court or a jury to choose between competing religious views or interpretations of church doctrine or dogma in order to resolve the dispute.”...
Defendants do ... assert a religious rationale for ... one relatively minor aspect of Father Makris’s conduct: his kissing of Plaintiffs..... [T]he fact that Defendants proffer a religious rationale does not mean that Defendants should be granted immunity from Plaintiffs’ claims. It merely means that Plaintiffs “may not offer a conflicting interpretation of the teachings of the [Greek Orthodox] Church or canon law to rebut [Defendants’] proffered religious reason.”... [H]owever, Plaintiffs are entitled to offer evidence and argument that Defendants’ proffered religious rationale was not the true rationale for Father Makris’s behavior.
