Grace asks court to protect property from state diocese

The leaders of Grace Church filed a complaint in El Paso County District Court on Friday to secure Grace’s landmark building — the first step in what could be a bitter legal battle for the church.

The vestry for Grace Church and St. Stephen’s Parish severed the parish’s ties with the Episcopal Church last month and affiliated with the Anglican province of Nigeria.

Greg Walta, Grace’s attorney, said the complaint essentially asks the court to protect the property from being taken over by the Episcopal Diocese of Colorado.

In a release, Grace officials said they filed the motion because the diocese had tried to freeze some of the church’s funds this week.

Grace Church, led by the Rev. Donald Armstrong, continues to meet in the historic downtown church building.

But the diocese says Grace’s days in the building are numbered. The rightful inhabitants, they say, are the remaining members of Grace Episcopal Church, who have been worshipping in Colorado College’s Shove Chapel.

Similar splits and property disputes are playing out across the country. Dozens of parishes have split from The Episcopal Church over issues of human sexuality, and most of these conservative parishes want to keep their historic churches.

Some courts might be sympathetic, but the Episcopal Church holds a strong card: By canon law, parishes only hold properties “in trust” for future Episcopal generations. All property is held for the Episcopal Church.

The Episcopal Church says parishioners are free to leave the denomination, but parishes are not.

Meanwhile, congregants on both sides of the issue want to worship in the church, designed by the architects who created the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. It was built in a classic Gothic style, its gables and spires and stained glass windows pointing to heaven.

“They made it beautiful to reflect the theology,” said the Rev. Michael O’Donnell, interim rector for Grace Episcopal Church.

The building reflects the Episcopalian emphasis of sacred space, he said. Every square foot has been sanctified, making it literally holy ground. It’s insured for $17 million, but for many parishioners, the place is priceless.

“It’s a special building,” said Elinor Garriques, a longtime member. “It holds a lot of sentimental memories.”

It will probably take a court decision to determine who will worship in the church.

No Episcopal parish in Colorado has split with the denomination and held onto its church building. Only one has even taken the matter to court: St. Mary’s Anglican Church in Denver split with the Episcopal Church in the mid-1980s over the issue of women being ordained priests, but lost possession of the church in 1986. The diocese later sold the property to St. Mary’s, and it still occupies the building.

The diocese hasn’t pressed its claim to the Tejon Street church yet, but there’s little doubt officials believe it’s theirs and will fight to keep it.

Grace Church parishioners, however, think their situation is unlike St. Mary’s.

Grace Church spokesman Alan Crippen said the property is deeded in name to Grace Church and St. Stephen’s, and the parish predates the creation of the Diocese of Colorado. Since 1987, Armstrong’s first year as rector, congregants paid for $6 million in renovations and improvements to the property.

Many Grace members think that leaving the property to the diocese would destroy it, spiritually and financially.

“The stark reality is that the Episcopal Church is dying,” Crippen said, noting the denomination’s declining membership. “If the diocese took over this property, I don’t think they could afford it.”

The property is carrying a $2.5-million debt and, according to Armstrong, has a yearly utility bill of $100,000. Crippen doubts there would be enough Episcopal loyalists to keep the building solvent.

O’Donnell says Grace Episcopal “absolutely” has enough members to keep the church afloat. He estimates that 500 people worshipped at Shove on Palm Sunday (others put the crowd at 200 to 300), and they gave $14,800 in offerings.

Attendance — and giving — would only increase if these worshippers were allowed to return to their home church, he said.

“It would be amazing how motivated those people would be,” O’Donnell said.

According to Crippen, Armstrong and his followers would willingly leave the building if a majority of the parish votes to stay with the Episcopal Church.

In other developments Friday, the diocese released details of its allegations that Grace’s longtime rector Armstrong misused church money, and Armstrong announced a 40-day discernment for the congregation to be followed by a vote in which parishioners will support or revoke the church’s break from the Episcopal church.

CONTACT THE WRITER: 636-0367 or paul.asay@gazette.com