California judge says parish that left Episcopal Church owns its property
By John H. Adams, The Layman Online, August 12, 2005
An Orange County, Calif., Superior Court judge has tentatively rejected the claim by the six-county Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles to the ownership of buildings and other property of a conservative congregation in Newport Beach that voted to leave the Episcopal Church (USA).
According to a story published by the Los Angeles Times and posted on Virtue Online, Judge David C. Velasquez said that the diocese had not shown that it would probably prevail in the property dispute with the St. James congregation.
Additional arguments are scheduled Monday, when Valasquez is expected to make his final ruling in the case.
The Episcopal case is one of several in California – including two involving Presbyterian Church (USA) congregations – which are major property disputes. In most of the cases, the congregations that voted to leave their denominations cited substantial disagreements over the doctrine and policies of their denominations.
Like the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Episcopal Church has a property trust clause that says a congregation’s property must revert to the denomination if the congregation votes to leave.
Valesquez cited two points in the written tentative ruling in favor of the defendants in the suit, St. James Church.
One, he said, “Plaintiffs have not presented evidence that title to the parish property has ever been held in the name of any other person or entity other than the parish since the time it was conveyed to the parish.”
Two, he cited the protections of the First Amendment, saying that the parish had made a prima facie case that it had been sued by the diocese after it had publicly disagreed with the national church’s views on homosexuality and other issues, according to the Times. “
Such acts arise out of and are in furtherance of the defendants’ exercise of the right to speak on a matter of ‘public interest,'” Velasquez wrote. “How churches in America are reacting to the different viewpoints on homosexuality is currently a topic of much public significance.”
The civil courts in California are also considering cases of two other Episcopal parishes that voted to leave the denomination – All Saints Church in Long Beach and St. David’s Church in North Hollywood. Rulings have not been made in those cases.
Last year, in a case involving the United Methodist Church and a Fresno congregation that left the denomination, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in California ruled that the congregation had the right to revoke the denomination’s property trust clause.
The California Supreme Court declined to review the appellate court ruling, in effect affirming it.
In the Methodist case, the appellate court said the California Corporations Code “does not authorize a general church to create a trust interest for itself in property owned simply by issuing a rule declaring that such a trust exists.” That ruling also said a local congregation’s agreement to hold property in trust “for the general church may be revoked by the local church unless the local church has expressly declared that trust to be irrevocable.”
The Times quoted Eric C. Sohlgren, an Irvine attorney who represents St. James, as cautioning that the judge could change his ruling. But, Sohlgren added, “If the court rules on Monday as it has tentatively ruled today, the case by the diocese and the other plaintiffs against St. James Church would be over,” he said.
Sohlgren acknowledged to the Times that Velasquez’s tentative ruling confirmed the parish’s contention that “St. James holds title to its own property.”
Attorney Larry Ebner, who represented the diocese, said the disagreements on church teachings were irrelevant. “This is a case where the church is trying to get its property back,” he told the Times.