An Episcopal priest who was found guilty of engaging in an adulterous relationship and other misconduct is now fighting to keep his ordination, taking his case to the denomination's highest review body after a hearing panel recommended he be permanently removed from ministry.

Rev. Daniel McClain, the former rector at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Oakwood, Ohio, filed an appeal with the Episcopal Church Court of Review following a guilty finding of conduct unbecoming a clergyman. The court met online last week to hear oral arguments from both sides, McClain's church attorney and a lawyer representing the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Ohio.

The case traces back years. McClain's wife filed for divorce in April 2022. At some point afterward, McClain began a romantic relationship with another woman he later married, while the divorce from his first spouse was still being finalized. The diocese placed him on administrative leave in February 2024 over accusations of unethical practices. By last November, a Title IV hearing panel had issued its order.

What the hearing panel found

The hearing panel's order did not hold back. It concluded that McClain had:

"engaged in Conduct Unbecoming a Member of the Clergy."

The order went further, describing what that meant in specific terms:

"This Conduct Unbecoming a Member of the Clergy consisted in a persistent pattern of conduct which included engaging in an adulterous relationship during marriage, failing to model a life of fidelity expected of a member of the clergy, and making decisions and taking actions which were not in line with the relationship between rector and the congregation entrusted to their pastoral care."

The panel recommended the most severe available sanction: that the Bishop Diocesan of Southern Ohio depose McClain from ministry entirely. Deposition, in Episcopal canon law, strips a priest of the authority to function as clergy.

The charges against McClain extended beyond adultery. He was also accused of violating COVID-19 protocols, allowing pet cats into the church sanctuary, and making questionable decisions about church finances, though the specific details of those allegations were not fully outlined in the proceedings reported so far.

Cases of clergy misconduct rocking congregations have become a recurring pattern across denominations in recent years, and the McClain case fits squarely into that broader reckoning.

McClain's defense: 'Cyberbullying at the hands of the church'

Deborah Stambaugh, the church attorney representing McClain, delivered oral arguments before the Court of Review and did not hold back. She cast her client as the victim of an unfair process and a hostile institutional campaign.

"Very unfair and very misleading information had been put out about him. Father Dan's dignity has not been respected. He has been made into a leper and a social pariah by what is nothing short of cyberbullying at the hands of the church."

On the adultery charge specifically, Stambaugh offered a sympathetic framing of McClain's personal circumstances:

"His wife abandoned him. He sought out healthy companionship that helped stabilize him through a turbulent time after being abandoned."

That characterization, "healthy companionship", does considerable work. It reframes what the hearing panel called "an adulterous relationship during marriage" and a "persistent pattern of conduct" as something closer to a lonely man seeking comfort after a broken home. Whether the Court of Review buys that reframing remains to be seen.

McClain himself has denied any wrongdoing. He currently works as a schoolteacher.

The diocese pushes back hard

Steven Ellcessor, the lawyer representing the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Ohio, told the Court of Review that most of the issues Stambaugh raised were "irrelevant to this review proceeding" and amounted to an attempt to "make it about something other than what it is."

Ellcessor drew a sharp distinction between McClain's case and other clergy adultery situations the church has handled. His argument cut to the question of repentance, or the lack of it:

"This is not a case, like many, where priests have engaged in adulterous affairs, realized their errors, confessed to their bishop, expressed repentance and accepted the consequences of their actions. This priest never reported his conduct to his bishop, continued his conduct openly for well over a year and remained unrepentant."

That framing is significant. Ellcessor was not arguing that adultery alone warrants deposition. He was arguing that McClain's refusal to acknowledge wrongdoing, combined with the duration and openness of the relationship, placed this case in a different category entirely. A priest who confesses and repents gets pastoral care. A priest who carries on for over a year without reporting to his bishop and shows no contrition gets the institutional equivalent of termination.

The distinction matters for how church discipline cases are handled across denominations, where the line between pastoral correction and punitive action is often contested.

A timeline that tells its own story

The facts, laid out in order, speak plainly. McClain's wife filed for divorce in April 2022. Sometime after that, he began a romantic relationship with another woman, while still legally married. He continued that relationship openly, as Ellcessor described it, "for well over a year." The diocese placed him on administrative leave in February 2024. The hearing panel issued its guilty finding and deposition recommendation last November.

That is roughly two and a half years from the divorce filing to the formal finding. During that stretch, McClain served as rector of a parish while conducting a relationship the church's own panel later deemed incompatible with his ordination vows. He eventually married the woman, though whether the divorce from his first wife had finalized by the time of the second marriage is not clear from available records.

The broader pattern, clergy whose private conduct eventually surfaces and upends their ministry, is one the American church has confronted repeatedly. The institutional fallout from clergy misconduct has cost denominations credibility, membership, and in some cases enormous sums of money.

What happens next

The Episcopal Church Court of Review has not yet issued a ruling on McClain's appeal. The court heard oral arguments online, but no timeline for a decision has been reported.

If the court upholds the hearing panel's recommendation, the matter would go to the Bishop Diocesan of Southern Ohio to act on the deposition. If the court sides with McClain, the case could be sent back for further proceedings or the recommendation could be overturned.

Several open questions hang over the case. Who initiated the Title IV proceedings, the diocese, a member of the congregation, or another party? What specific financial decisions drew scrutiny? And what procedural arguments, if any, did Stambaugh raise about whether McClain was given a fair chance to address the hearing panel before it ruled?

McClain's attorney framed the entire process as fundamentally unjust, accusing the church of turning her client into a pariah. The diocese's lawyer framed it as a straightforward case of a priest who broke his vows, hid it from his bishop, and refused to repent. Those are not easily reconciled positions.

The case also raises a question that extends well beyond one Ohio parish: what standard of personal conduct should denominations hold their clergy to, and what process is fair when that standard is allegedly violated? In an era when hidden conduct by pastors has produced consequences ranging from quiet resignations to criminal prosecutions, the answer matters more than ever.

The Episcopal Church, like many mainline Protestant denominations, has spent decades loosening its theological expectations on a range of issues. But its Title IV process still treats adultery by clergy as a serious offense, at least on paper. Whether the Court of Review treats it that way in practice will say something about whether the denomination's internal standards still mean what they say.

Institutions that refuse to hold their own leaders accountable eventually discover they have no leaders worth following. The congregation at St. Paul's in Oakwood already knows that.