" The newly formed congregation of Annapolis Evangelical Lutheran Church (NALC) held their first service today at 9:00 a.m. They were hoping 150 would come, instead 253 showed up! The congregation met and will continue meeting in the gymnasium of the Annapolis Area Christian School located at 716 Bestgate Road in Annapolis, MD. The pastor, Rev. Gerald Miller, also announced Lenten services will be held on Wednesday evenings during Lent in the school's library. The members of the new congregation, along with Pastor Miller, left St. Martin's Lutheran Church in Annapolis, after that congregation's vote to leave the ELCA failed by three votes.
"Living Water Lutheran Church, a newly formed congregation in Centerville, Ohio, comprised of former members of Epiphany Lutheran Church (ELCA),now has over 450 members. Epiphany's second vote to leave the ELCA failed by a few votes. The new congregation, under the leadership of the Rev. Todd Kornahrens, a former pastor at Epiphany Lutheran, has been meeting for worship at Weller Elementary School in Centerville, while they waited for a permanent site on East Franklin Street to be ready. However, the new congregation has outgrown the Franklin Street facility and has recently signed a lease to meet at the Johnathan Wright Elementary School, 40 Florence Drive, Springboro. Pastor Kornahren said:"The goal is to connect people with Christ. We are not going to be the anti-anything church. We're going to be pro--pro-God, pro-family, pro-working for community."
"Meanwhile, on the ALPB Forum Online, the Rev. Richard Johnson wrote: "Here's an interesting story. One of the congregations that has left the ELCA in the Sierra Pacific is Life Lutheran Church, Richmond, CA, one of two Chinese ministries in the synod (the other one left as well). Some years ago they had been given the property of a closed congregation (closed, actually, if I recall correctly, by the present pastor of Herchurch). Now the synod's attorneys are telling them that they must vacate the property and turn it back to the synod. The justification for this is that when the synod deeded the property to the congregation, there was a clause in the deed saying that it would revert to the synod should it ever cease to be used in mission in the furtherance of "this church." Now "this church" clearly is the way the ELCA refers to itself (rather grandiosely, IMO), and in the ELCA constitution it is clear that when they say "this church" it's the ELCA they are talking about. It does not, however--or so I've been told--say this in the deed by which the property was conveyed to the congregation. And so the legal question is an interesting one, since one has to read it against the clear constitutional provision that when a congregation leaves to affiliate with another Lutheran denomination (and they have affiliated with LCMC, as I understand it), they keep the property.
"Interesting legal questions aside, I'm astonished that the synod wants to put itself in the situation of bringing suit to recover property given to an ethnic minority congregation, located in a place where the ELCA had been unable to keep a viable congregation going." [continued on Barnhart's blog]
The semantics of “this Church” are very disturbing.
Clearly the ELCA had long regarded itself as separate and distinct from the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church—then on August 19, 2009, it vaunted itself over against the Bride of Christ.