Two pastors who operated a Tullamore church’s Facebook page must pay €14,400 in damages to an electrical contractor after a Circuit Court defamation case over a video of his daughter’s baptism speech.
Judge Meehan found that the daughter’s remarks damaged her father’s reputation. She was not a defendant. The judge ruled that the pastors had a defence of qualified privilege for the remarks made to about 80 people at the church ceremony on 14 May 2023. That defence did not apply to the video, which remained on the church’s publicly accessible Facebook page for about 20 days.
The judgment said the daughter spoke about her parents’ relationship and alleged that her father had called her names, restricted her activities and would not let her return to live with her mother. The pastor congratulated her afterwards. The pastors said they had not vetted the speech and did not know in advance what she would say.
The judge found the pastors were secondary publishers of the remarks made at the ceremony: they had organised the event and invited the daughter to speak but did not know the particular words she would use. The congregation had a moral or social interest in hearing her reasons for baptism, the judgment said, so the church publication was protected by qualified privilege.
The online publication was different. The pastors controlled the church’s Facebook page and left the video available after hearing the remarks. The judgment said they became primary publishers of the online material and could not rely on innocent publication or qualified privilege for it. The video was removed on 2 June 2023, the day the pastors received a solicitor’s letter from the father.
The court attributed 40% of the total reputational damage to the remarks at the ceremony and 60% to the online publication. It assigned the pastors 80% responsibility for the online publication and the daughter 20%. Because the father’s claim against his daughter was statute-barred, the judgment treated him as responsible for her share under the Civil Liability Act 1961. The pastors were therefore liable for 48% of the total damage.
The judge assessed the full value of the damage at €30,000, citing the seriousness of the allegations, their limited circulation and the prompt removal of the video. The court ordered the two pastors to pay 48% of that sum, or €14,400. The judgment did not order an apology or an undertaking against future publication.