Posted on 01/23/2006 4:53:14 AM PST by .cnI redruM
The cruelty and avarice of church bureaucrats is beyond belief, no pun intended.
The young single and young married are indifferent to church membership. I can't say I blame them. The mega-churches are as greedy if not more greedy than the rest.
Send them an email, THANKING THEM for taking a rare stand for the Bible, against the homosexual agenda, in the Episcopal Church.
info@thefallschurch.org
Our Episcopal church left the ECUSA because of this and their support of abortion...I am happy we are with a great group of Anglicans: http://www.theamia.org
Homosexual Agenda Ping.
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A good example of people doing something to fight against the "gay" agenda. Good for them. I hope others get inspired by their example.
Brilliant and impressive. We belong to a PCUSA church in San Diego that is part of the Confessing Churches movement but whenever we send someone to national to represent us, I have to ignore what comes out, or just hold my nose.
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(Better late than never... just checking in briefly.)
That (and the rest of your post) is not an accurate statement of the facts nor the current law.
The ECUSA and the PCUSA claim an implied trust over property, even if it is held in the name of the local parish. The property itself may be held in the name of the local congregation, a separate corporation, or in the name of the central authority.
It would be quite rare for the property to be held in the name of a higher body in the Presbyterian church; the practice among the Episcopalians varies.
In California, the rule is if the property is in the name of the parish or a parish corporation, and there is no explicit trust document, then the locals win. The Pennsylvania case is muddy. The court seems to recognize the validity of an implied trust, but scours the church legal documents to find an intent to create a trust.
According to the SCOTUS, in a case out of Georgia, courts should not get into theological issues in deciding who is the 'true church', but should apply neutral principles of law.
San Diego is one of the better presbyteries, so you are probably safe in the short term. Now if you were in Los Angeles, you would have to worry about the Koran quoters coming in, throwing out your pastor, and taking over.
I'd imagine they aren't far from the Reformed Episcopal Church.
I've been to this church. This is a very prestigious Episcopal church, one of the oldest in America. George Washington was one on it's vestry (board of elders). The suburban town of "Falls Church" Virginia (ca. 1690s) is named for this particular church. In the '80s evangelicals got control of the vestry and were able to call a solidly biblically orthodox Rector. Thank goodness, no, really thank God they are taking public action against their apostate bishop.
This is the same Bishop Lee who dared to claim to have "defrocked" (a word usually referring to discipline for a moral lapse) a Northern Virginia priest who dared to resign from the Episcopal denomination, (but who refused to resign from the priesthood) to join with the Anglican Mission in America (under a foreign bishop...still a part of the Anglican Communion).
Christ is Lord of his (true & invisible) Church! Let judgement begin with His people.
Believe it or not, as with most of the mainlines, the trust clauses on the land are a RECENT thing....occuring only since the theologically liberal have been in charge of the denominations . . .(why who'd of thought of that?). For the ECUSA (often called "Eck-YU-sah")(the Episcopals) the trust clause of the denomination controlling the land over and above the parish only dates to 1979.
Some of the older churches have more of a legal case however...as some faithful churches like Falls Church or Truro (also in Northern VA) date back to colonial times to the Church of England...and the formal Episcopal church only dates to the early 1800s.
>>>This is the same Bishop Lee who dared to claim to have "defrocked"....
Canon law is fairly specific as to who may defrock, or excommunicate who... Does a parish Bishop have that administrative authority?
The Falls Church is but one of 6. The 6 largest-member Churches in No. VA, among them the Falls Church, Truro Church, Church of the Apostles, are all fighting this battle with Bp. Lee.
They have also refused to monitarily support the Diocese since the Robinson vote - so the Diocese is really hurting. We used to joke about how Bp. Lee was going to be driving himself soon. Apparently there's still enough money that he still has his driver. I guess since he has a propensity for using College kids, he can still afford them. Sigh. I was hoping for some personal pain for the Bishop.
BTW, it's truly disgusting to read that the reason Bishop Lee decided to vote FOR Robinson was that his wife asked him if he was going to stay in the 19th Century or "be modern", or somesuch words. THEN he came up with the justification for his vote, that he felt that the people of New Hampshire had the right to vote whomever they wanted for their Bishop.
You forgot AMia. Most of the ECUSA Churches I know who are leaving, are leaving for AMiA.
You wrote, "BTW, it's truly disgusting to read that the reason Bishop Lee decided to vote FOR Robinson was that his wife asked him if he was going to stay in the 19th Century or "be modern", or somesuch words. THEN he came up with the justification for his vote, that he felt that the people of New Hampshire had the right to vote whomever they wanted for their Bishop."
Yes, it is disgusting that Lee has obviously ignored the vows he took when he was consecrated bishop to "banish and drive away from the Church all erroneous and strange doctrine contrary to God's Word" and to "openly call upon and encourage others to do the same". Likewise, Lee has abandoned the Word of God in favor of the word of his equally in error wife. Sadly, a once great church has fallen.
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