Vatican upholds excommunication of former deacon, who plans to appeal

(OSV News) — The Vatican has upheld the excommunication of a former permanent deacon in Louisiana who formally left the Church and joined an Anglican congregation for a period of time after his son was sexually abused by a priest.

In a declaration dated May 22 and signed Oct. 16, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith confirmed the 2024 excommunication of Scott Peyton by Bishop J. Douglas Deshotel of Lafayette.

A copy of the declaration was posted online in an Oct. 19 Acadiana News First interview with Peyton, following an Oct. 16 meeting he and his canon lawyer, Dawn Eden Goldstein, had with the bishop, during which Peyton was informed of the dicastery’s decision.

The Vatican response comes as Father Michael Guidry, convicted in 2019 of molesting Peyton’s then-teenaged son, is set to be released from prison Nov. 14 after serving a seven-year sentence.

The priest — who had been pastor of St. Peter Catholic Church in Morrow, Louisiana, where Peyton served as deacon — confessed to abusing the teen.

Settled civil lawsuit against diocese in 2021

The family settled a civil lawsuit against the Diocese of Lafayette in April 2021, with the diocese issuing a statement on May 7, 2021, saying it had found the allegations against Father Guidry credible and formally apologizing to the family.

Father Guidry appears on the diocese’s list of credibly accused priests.

OSV News has not yet received a response from the diocese regarding the post-incarceration priestly status of Father Guidry, who will be required to register as a sex offender upon his release.

Shortly after joining the Anglican congregation, Peyton and his family moved to a nondenominational church. The former deacon chose to appeal the excommunication by Bishop Deshotel, which resulted in the Vatican’s response.

Peyton plans to appeal the dicastery’s decision, said Goldstein, who is representing Peyton on a pro bono basis.

Bishop Deshotel had issued a March 2024 decree of excommunication following Peyton’s December 2023 email stating his intention to resign from the diaconate and leave the Catholic Church. 

Officially joined an Anglican church

In January 2024, Peyton and his family officially joined Trinity Anglican Church in Lafayette, with the former deacon announcing the news on Facebook several weeks later. 

In his 2024 decree, Bishop Deshotel specified that Peyton had “incurred the ‘latae sententiae’ censure of excommunication,” which — unlike a “ferendae sententiae” canonical penalty, which is not binding until it is formally imposed on an offender — is “incurred automatically upon the commission of an offense” specifically prohibited under canon law, such as apostasy, heresy, schism and abortion.

The Vatican agreed that the charge of schism was accurate.

But Goldstein told OSV News that while Peyton “has always maintained that he was willing to abide by the terms of the ‘latae sententiae’ excommunication,” he “contests that he acted with ‘dolus,’” the canon law term for “malice.”

“He never became Anglican because he preferred the Anglican Church to the Catholic Church on any kind of theological level,” Goldstein said. “What he wished was to keep his kids worshipping in a Christian church.”

She pointed to the “religious trauma” experienced by Peyton, his son and the entire family amid “multiple pastoral failures” made by the bishop.

Bishop’s warning could have been ‘more explicit’

In its declaration, the dicastery said it “acknowledges that Bishop Deshotel could have been more explicit in warning Deacon Peyton about the canonical consequences of his proposed course of action.”

At the same time, the dicastery noted “it was not evident what Deacon Peyton meant by ‘leave the Catholic Church and the diaconate’ until after he joined the Anglican Communion.”

Msgr. John Paul Kimes, a canon law scholar and a Maronite priest, told OSV News that that the Vatican’s decision “was confirmed” by the former deacon’s official entrance “into a religious community not in communion with the Church.”

Under canon law, a crime — termed a “delict” — “contains an objective element and then a subjective one,” said Msgr. Kimes, who is the Mark Moritz and Family Memorial Professor of the Practice at the University of Notre Dame Law School, as well as the Raymond of Peñafort Fellow of the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture at the university.

Peyton’s “arguments are all based on the subjective element; the objective element — that he left the Catholic Church — is clear and not contested,” said Msgr. Kimes. “His arguments about the subjective element are based on emotional arguments, not actual legal ones.”

Msgr. Kimes said that “while there is certainly a path for Deacon Peyton to return to the Catholic Church,” returning to future ministry “is a different question.”

If Peyton “wanted to return to the Church as a functioning deacon, he would not only have to seek the remission of his excommunication, but also the dispensation” from an additional canonical penalty of “irregularity” for the holy orders he received.

In its declaration, the dicastery underscored the “medicinal nature of the censure of excommunication,” and expressed hope that Peyton’s “reconciliation” to the Church “may in fact come about.”

Gina Christian is a multimedia reporter for OSV News. Follow her on X @GinaJesseReina.

Story updated 9:39 p.m. ET Nov. 9, 2026.

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