Local church case echoes Calif. suit

SANTA ANA, Calif. - In a case that mirrors one in Colorado Springs, buildings used by three Episcopal parishes that broke away from the mother church in a dispute over a gay bishop should be placed under the control of the Los Angeles diocese, an appeals court ruled.

Relying on church law, California’s 4th District Court of Appeal ruled this week, “The right of the general church in this case to enforce a trust on the local parish property is clear.”

But the three judges on the panel made it clear they were staying out of doctrinal disputes. “Readers will look in vain in this opinion for any indication of what religious controversy may have prompted the disaffiliation,” Judge David G. Sills wrote. “That controversy is irrelevant to this action.”

The case is similar to one pending in Colorado Springs. Earlier this year, the Rev. Donald Armstrong and his followers at Grace Episcopal Church severed ties with the Episcopal Church over the ordination of gay clergy. They now affiliate with the Convocation of Anglicans in North America, or CANA, and the Anglican province of Nigeria.

The breakaway group has continued to use the $17 million Grace Episcopal Church and St. Stephens Parish buildings on North Tejon Street, although the Episcopal Diocese of Colorado says it is the lawful owner.

Attorneys on both sides of the case disagree about how the California decision dovetails with their legal arguments.

L. Martin Nussbaum, attorney for the Colorado diocese and local parish, says the ruling reinforces a similar one — Diocese of Colorado v. Mote — upheld by the Colorado Supreme Court in 1986. In that case, a breakaway parish tried to keep church property, but the court ruled the property belonged to the diocese.

“It (the California decision) is a very scholarly explanation of the law that affirms the freedom of a national church to determine its own rules and governance, and in the case of the Episcopal church, prevents a portion of a local congregation to leave the church and take the property,” Nussbaum says.

But Grace CANA’s attorney, Greg Walta, says Colorado v. Mote isn’t as clear-cut when it comes to the local case. The 1986 ruling turned on the fact that the parish had been a mission church under control of the diocese for 20 years, and its organizing document ceded control over its property to the diocese, he says. In contrast, Walta contends that Grace’s articles of incorporation do not mention the diocese, it has title to the local church property and a long history of acting independently from the diocese and at times in defiance of the diocese.

“Our case is more like Dickey v. Snodgrass, a Colorado case that ruled for a local church,” Walta said. “So the outcome will depend on the facts in the case.”

In the California case, diocese officials were pleased by the decision.

“Now we can get about the business of healing and about the business of being a church,” said the Rev. J. Jon Bruno, bishop of the diocese.

But Eric Sohlgren, lead lawyer for the three parishes, said the decision ran counter to 30 years of legal precedent in California. The parishes will decide soon whether to appeal to the California Supreme Court.