## Facts

- Norman Redwing alleged that, as a minor parishioner at Holy Names Catholic Church in Memphis in the early–mid 1970s, he was sexually abused by Father Milton Guthrie, a diocesan priest.
- Redwing claimed Guthrie used his clerical position and Redwing’s trust to engage in sexual acts with him over a period of years.
- Redwing alleged the Diocese trained, supervised, and controlled Guthrie’s activities with minors and knew or should have known of Guthrie’s propensity to abuse children.
- Redwing asserted the Diocese failed to exercise reasonable care to protect minors and concealed abuse and complaints.
- In 2008, more than 30 years after the alleged abuse, Redwing sued the Diocese for damages, including negligent hiring, negligent supervision, negligent retention, and breach of fiduciary duty.
- The case reached the Tennessee Supreme Court on the Diocese’s motion to dismiss; the allegations were taken as true for that purpose.

## Issues

1. Whether the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine deprived Tennessee courts of subject-matter jurisdiction over tort claims against a diocese for negligent hiring, supervision, and retention arising from alleged sexual abuse by a priest.
2. Whether the complaint showed, as a matter of law at the motion-to-dismiss stage, that the claims were barred by Tennessee’s one-year statute of limitations for personal injury, or whether accrual under the discovery rule required factual development.

## Decision

- The Tennessee Supreme Court held that Tennessee courts have subject-matter jurisdiction over Redwing’s negligence-based claims and that ecclesiastical abstention did not bar the claims at the pleading stage.
- The Court reversed the Court of Appeals’ ruling that negligent hiring and negligent retention were categorically barred by ecclesiastical abstention.
- The Court held the complaint did not “affirmatively and clearly” establish that the claims were time-barred, given the discovery rule and allegations of delayed awareness of injury and causation.
- The Court reversed the Court of Appeals’ dismissal and remanded for further proceedings.

## Legal Principles

- Ecclesiastical abstention bars civil adjudication only when resolving the dispute would require deciding questions of faith, doctrine, discipline, or ecclesiastical rule or custom.
- Claims against religious entities may proceed when they can be resolved using neutral principles of law, including ordinary tort concepts of duty, breach, causation, and damages, without interpreting religious doctrine.
- On a motion to dismiss, a statute-of-limitations defense warrants dismissal only when the complaint itself affirmatively and clearly shows the claim is time-barred.
- Under Tennessee’s discovery rule, a cause of action accrues when the plaintiff knows or, through reasonable diligence, should know of the injury and that it was caused by wrongful conduct; in child sexual abuse cases, alleged delayed recognition of injury and causation may preclude limitations dismissal at the pleading stage.

## Conclusion

The Tennessee Supreme Court permitted negligence and related tort claims against a diocese based on alleged clergy sexual abuse to proceed past dismissal, holding that neutral tort principles allow jurisdiction notwithstanding ecclesiastical abstention and that limitations could not be resolved against the plaintiff solely from the pleadings given the discovery-rule accrual allegations.


Redwing v. Catholic Bishop for the Diocese of Memphis, 363 S.W.3d 436 (Tenn. 2012)