Conger

The Episcopal Church’s legal battles entered a new phase last week, as lawyers for the national church filed suit in California against the Bishop and Diocese of San Joaquin in a bid to take control of its assets, while the Methodist Church sought to enter the fray in Virginia on behalf of the diocese.

Lawyers for the national church filed suit in a Fresno County Superior Court on April 24, seeking to transfer the assets of the diocese under the control of Bishop John-David Schofield based in Fresno to the new diocese based in Stockton created by Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori under former Northern California Bishop Jerry Lamb.

“While it is regrettable that legal action is necessary, the diocese and The Episcopal Church have no other viable option but to seek the intervention of the court to recover the property and assets of the diocese,” said Bishop Lamb, the provisional Bishop of San Joaquin–Stockton

Last December, a supermajority of clergy and lay delegates at the San Joaquin-Fresno synod voted to quit the Episcopal Church and join the Province of the Southern Cone. Dioceses may not succeed from the Episcopal Church as “such actions are contrary to the Canons and Constitution of The Episcopal Church and the diocese,” the media Stockton diocese said.

Writing to the Fresno diocese, Bishop Schofield said, “please be assured that we have been expecting this litigation, and the contents contain no surprises,” adding that “in spite of the claims by The Episcopal Church, nothing in their current constitution and canons prohibits a diocese from leaving one province and moving to another.”

Bishop Schori’s handling of the San Joaquin affair has raised concerns. One group of bishops and church leaders commissioned a legal opinion on the validity of her actions from an international lawyer, who concluded she had committed 11 violations of canon law and should be brought to trial for abuse of office.

The Presiding Bishop issued a counter statement the same day, saying that her advisors had concluded that she had properly interpreted church canons. The Episcopal Church has no independent judiciary and has no way of reconciling opposing views save through political confrontations.

In Virginia the United Methodist Church on April 24 filed a brief in support of the national church and Diocese of Virginia against the breakaway congregations now grouped under the banner of CANA.

The Methodist Church argued that Virginia’s law granting congregations to withdraw from their parent churches in the case of schisms raised questions of the “appropriateness of the government’s intrusion into the freedom of any church body to organize and govern itself according to its own faith and doctrine.”

Virginia’s Attorney-General Robert McDowell in January filed a brief opposing the national Episcopal Church’s. A spokesman for the breakaway congregations, Jim Oakes, said the law, enacted in the wake of denominational splits following the American Civil War, was a tested and “reasonably neutral way for the state to adjudicate” the dispute.

An American state court has handed the Episcopal Church a major defeat in its battle for control of the property of breakaway congregations in Virginia, rejecting its argument that there was no “division” in the Episcopal Church.

In an 88 page opinion released on April 3, Fairfax County Judge Randy Bellows held that a Nineteenth century law governing the disposition of church property in the event of a church schism applied to the dispute between the Diocese of Virginia and CANA—the American jurisdiction of the Church of Nigeria.

The Episcopal Church and Diocese of Virginia last year brought suit against 11 congregations of the Anglican District of Virginia seeking control of the breakaway parish properties, including the diocese’s two largest congregations—Truro Parish and the Falls Church in suburban Washington.

Judge Bellows rejected the Episcopal Church’s contention that the CANA secessions were a local matter. He held “it blinks at reality to characterize the ongoing division within the diocese, [the Episcopal Church], and the Anglican Communion as anything but a division of the first magnitude.”

“The rapidity with which [The Episcopal Church's] problems became that of the Anglican Communion, and the consequent impact-in some cases the extraordinary impact-on its provinces around the world,” he said.

The Episcopal Church and the Diocese have challenged the legality of the law, saying it violates Federal constitutional guarantees separating Church and State. A hearing before Judge Bellows is scheduled for May 28 on this issue. Virginia’s Attorney General has announced he will defend the legality of the statute against the Episcopal Church’s claims. The third phase of the litigation—disposition of the property—will be addressed later this year.

While the trial court’s ruling on the applicability of the relevant law does not rule out the Episcopal Church eventually prevailing in the fight, the April 3 ruling comes as a blow to the Church’s plans to use civil courts to enforce the interpretation of Church canons by the Presiding Bishop.

The Virginia law “plainly deprives the Episcopal Church and the Diocese, as well as all hierarchical churches, of their historic constitutional rights to structure their polity free from governmental interference and thus violates the First Amendment and cannot be enforced,” US Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori said on April 4.

The Diocese of Virginia objected to the ruling as well arguing that the “people in the CANA congregations were free to leave, but they cannot take Episcopal property with them.”

A spokesman for the parishes lauded the judge’s decision that upheld its contention that “”our churches’ own trustees hold title for the benefit of the congregations.”

CANA Bishop Martyn Minns said he was confident they would prevail. “There will be another hearing on the constitutional issues that have been raised and I am sure that there will be a variety of appeals but we are confident of the rightness of the path that we have chosen and grateful to God for his favor,” he said.

CANA Bishop Martyn Minns appears to have been inadvertently invited to the Lambeth Conference.

A clerical error, or as one aide suggested-deliberate mischief - caused a flurry of excitement at Lambeth Palace this week after reports surfaced that Bishop Minns had been asked to pledge his financial support to assist overseas bishops to attend the conference.

The fundraising letter was part of a mass mailing sent to all of the bishops of the Communion asking their help in defraying the £3,500 conference costs to assist their brethren from the developing world to attend the gathering. Bishop Minns told The Church of England Newspaper he had received the letter last week, which closed with the note that the conference organisers looked forward to seeing him at Lambeth this July.

Bishop Gene Robinson of New Hampshire told CEN he had ‘not received any kind of invitation to Lambeth, and my plans remain up in the air’.

Attempts to contact Dr Nolbert Kunonga, the former Bishop of Harare, to ascertain whether he had received the note were unsuccessful.

A spokesman for Lambeth Palace stated there had been no change in the Archbishop of Canterbury’s invitation policy, and they were at a loss to explain the letter. The Lambeth Conference organizing committee stated it had not sent the letters, and suggested it might have been a hoax to create further mischief in the run up to the summer gathering.

The state has intervened in the Diocese of Virginia property lawsuits, backing the legal arguments of the Nigerian-led breakaway group, CANA.

In a brief filed in the Fairfax County Circuit Court on Jan 10, Virginia Attorney General Bob McDonnell defended the constitutionality of a state law governing church property disputes, dealing a sharp blow to Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori’s campaign to halt the defection of traditionalist congregations through litigation.

“As a matter of federal constitutional law, the Episcopal Church is simply wrong. The Constitution does not require that local church property disputes be resolved by deferring to national and regional church leaders,” the government brief said.

While not addressing the factual issues in dispute between the Diocese of Virginia and the Episcopal Church in its suit against the 11 breakaway congregations, the attorney general said CANA’s legal arguments were “constitutionally sound.”

Virginia law states that if the majority of a congregation’s members decide to secede from their parent church, that congregation can retain the parish property, if there is no legal encumbrance recorded on the property deed.

The Attorney General stated the “Episcopal Church believes that, when there is a property dispute involving a hierarchical denomination, the National and Virginia Constitutions require deference to regional and national church leaders.”

This was false, he argued, as civil law governs church property disputes when issues of doctrine are not before the court.

Lawyers for the Episcopal Church have disputed the applicability of the Virginia statute that allows congregations to keep their property, and have also disputed the constitutionality of the law.

Nigeria has added four more bishops to the roster of CANA, the Convocation of Anglicans in North America.  Their election will increase the total number of African-sponsored missionary bishops to the United States to 17 by year’s end: six from Nigeria, two from Uganda, two from Kenya, and seven from Rwanda

The President of the American Anglican Council, the Rev. Canon David Anderson, the former rector of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Akron, Ohio, the Rev. Canon Roger Ames, and two Nigerian priests serving expatriate African congregations in the United States, the Ven. Amos Fagbamiye and the Rev. Canon Nathan Kanu were elected by the Nigerian House of Bishops on Sept 12.

The four will be consecrated later this year in the US and will assist Bishop Martyn Minns in “providing an indigenous ecclesiastical structure for faithful Anglicans in this country,” CANA said.

The Nigerian House of Bishops also re-elected five and elected two new archbishops.  Edmund Akanya of Kebbi succeeded the Josiah Idowu-Fearon as Archbishop of Kaduna and Benjamin Kwashi of Jos succeeded the Emmanuel Mani as Archbishop of Jos.

The Archbishop of Lagos, Ephraim Ademowo of Lagos; the Archbishop of Owerri, Bennett Okoro of Orlu; the Archbishop of Ondo,  Samuel Abe of Ekiti; and the Archbishop of Ibadan,  Joseph Akinfenwa of Ibadan were re-elected to five year terms.

According to a press release published on CANA’s website, the convocation now boasts 60 congregations and 80 clergy spread across 20 states.  A quarter of CANA’s members are Nigerian immigrants, with the balance consisting for the most part of former members of The Episcopal Church.

Canon Ames, who with his parish seceded from the Episcopal Church in 2005 for the Diocese of Bolivia, said that approximately 50 former Episcopal parishes under the jurisdiction of the Bolivian church were in talks with CANA to transfer jurisdictions.

On March 7, the Nigerian House of Bishops stated that in light of the Primates’ Dar es Salaam communiqué it would “defer the request for additional Episcopal elections for CANA until our meeting in September 2007.”  The rejection by the US House of Bishops of the Primates pastoral scheme for US traditionalists prompted last week’s election.

On Sept 15 Archbishop Henry Orombi of Uganda issued a statement endorsing the elections.  The rejection by the US bishops of the “Pastoral Scheme presented to them unanimously by the Primates of the Anglican Communion and the subsequent rejection by TEC’s Executive Council” was “evidence of this desperate need to care for, support, and encourage orthodox Anglicans and Episcopalians in America,” he said.

The election of four more bishops will not divide the conservative movement in North America he said.  The “renewal of Anglicanism in America” will come through a unity “based in the Word of God” and “demonstrated through its Bishops who work together cooperatively and collaboratively for increased mission in America.”

The Archbishop of Canterbury’s denunciation of the Bishop of Uyo for demonizing homosexuals is unfounded and relies upon an unsubstantiated news report, the Church of Nigeria reports.

Coming two weeks before his meeting with the American bishops in New Orleans, where he hopes to be able to salvage that Church’s position within the Anglican Communion, Dr. Williams’ comments come as an ‘own goal’ in his relations with the Global South, and may have materially weakened his ability to hold the Communion together.

On Sept 7, the Anglican Consultative Council’s press office released a statement saying Dr. Williams had expressed “deep shock” at remarks made by the Bishop of Uyo, the Rt. Rev. Isaac Orama.

A Sept 2 United Press International (UPI) report based on a News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) story, quoted Bishop Orama as having said “Homosexuality and lesbianism are inhuman. Those who practice them are insane, satanic and are not fit to live because they are rebels to God’s purpose for man.”

Such comments were “unacceptable and profoundly shocking on the lips of any Christian,” Dr. Williams said, and added that that “primates, along with all other official bodies in the Anglican Communion, have consistently called for an end to homophobia, violence and hatred.”

The Primate of Nigeria, Archbishop Peter Akinola had been asked for an explanation of the remarks, the statement said.

However, a spokesman for the Church of Nigeria, Archdeacon Akintunde Popoola told The Church of England Newspaper the story was false.

The Bishop of Uyo “denied making such a statement,” the Province’s spokesman said.

While the Bishop’s address to his diocesan synod did speak to the issue of human sexuality dividing the Communion, the Church of Nigeria’s position on these issues, and the creation of CANA-the Nigerian church’s missionary district in the United States, “he did not say that [homosexuals] are to be hated, not that they are insane nor unfit to live.”

The NAN reporter has “apologized for the misrepresentation and promised a retraction” Archdeacon Popoola said.

On Sept 7 UPI removed the story from its website.

A spokesman for Lambeth Palace on Sept 8 told CEN it was unaware that UPI had removed the story. He noted that while Dr. Williams’ condemnation of such anti-homosexual sentiments stood, his censure of the Nigerian bishop had been conditional upon confirmation of the facts from Archbishop Akinola.

The Rev Canon David Anderson at the ACN Council meeting in Texas on July 31, 2007.

The Rev. Canon David Anderson, president of the American Anglican Council, is one of four new bishops that the Anglican Church of Nigeria announced it is adding to the roster of CANA, the Convocation of Anglicans in North America.

The Rev. Roger Ames, rector of St. Luke’s Anglican Church, Akron, Ohio, is another American elected by the Nigerian House of Bishops on Sept. 12. The other two bishops-elect are Nigerian priests serving expatriate African congregations in the United States, the Ven. Amos Fagbamiye and the Rev. Canon Nathan Kanu.

Plans call for the four to be consecrated in the United States either in late November or the first week of December, according to Fr. Ames, who said that he has been informed that a number of Global South primates will participate in the consecration.

The new bishops will join the Rt. Rev. Martyn Minns, missionary bishop of CANA, and the Rt. Rev. David Bena, the retired suffragan Bishop of Albany, in the oversight of Nigeria’s American congregations.

In an interview with The Living Church, Fr. Ames said all of the parish leadership and the congregation of St. Luke’s left The Episcopal Church about two years ago for the Diocese of Bolivia in the Province of the Southern Cone, but because the Diocese of Ohio has not to date included the departure in its parochial report filings with the national church, he and the congregation continue officially to be designated members in good standing of The Episcopal Church.

Fr. Ames said there are currently about 50 former Episcopal congregations affiliated with the Diocese of Bolivia. These are in the process of being transferred to CANA by mutual agreement of Bishop Minns and the Rt. Rev. Frank Lyons, Bishop of Bolivia. According to a press release published on CANA’s website, the convocation now has 60 congregations and 80 clergy in 20 states.

The election of the four will increase the number of African-sponsored missionary bishops in the United States to 17: six from Nigeria, two from Uganda, two from Kenya, and seven from Rwanda.

Published in The Living Church.

The Church of Nigeria has denounced as racist and demeaning suggestions that Archbishop Peter Akinola’s Aug 20 pastoral letter was ghost written by his American bishop, the Rt. Rev. Martyn Minns.

The charges of American manipulation of African Archbishops were “another attempt to divert attention” away from the root causes of the crisis of faith and order in the Anglican Communion, it said.

On Aug 24 the Church Times reported “computer tracking software suggests” the pastoral was “extensively edited and revised over a four-day period” by Bishop Minns. The article stated there were “about 600 insertions made by Bishop Minns, including whole new sections amounting to two-thirds of the final text. There is also a sprinkling of minor amendments made by Canon Chris Sugden of the conservative group Anglican Mainstream.”

The Rev. Colin Coward, director of Changing Attitude charged the Church Times report confirmed his suspicions that American conservatives, not African bishops were driving the Global South’s calls for discipline of the US church.

The Church Times report “demonstrates that the most extreme demands being made of the Anglican Communion by the secessionists originate not with Archbishop Akinola in Nigeria but from Bishop Minns and other extreme conservatives associated with CANA.”

“The conservatives who have been driving the Global South agenda have tried to present themselves as orthodox in contrast to what they claim is TEC’s heterodoxy. In their campaign to defeat those of us who support the full inclusion of LGBT people in the Anglican Communion, they are prepared to use methods which we believe to be abusive, dishonest and fail to embody Christian values,” Mr. Coward said.

The Church of Nigeria’s director of communications Archdeacon Akintunde Popoola responded that it was “very insulting and racist to infer that the Primate of All Nigeria is being dictated to.”

Archdeacon Popoola stated work on the pastoral letter began in Abuja on Aug 6, as staffers gathered research for the letter. A first draft was read by Archbishop Akinola on Aug 9, but no corrections were made at that time.

Archbishop Akinola then traveled to the United States, and working in the offices of Bishop Minns, completed the letter. The charge that Bishop Minns wrote the letter was nonsensical, Archdeacon Popoola said.

“I fail to see any issue if amendments are then made on Bp. Minns’ computer” by Archbishop Akinola. “Apart from the fact that they were together during the period of the amendment, the Archbishop like many effective leaders who spend little time glued to a desk often phones me and other staffs to write certain things. Such remain his idea and anyone who knows Abp. Peter Akinola knows you can not make him say what he does not mean,” he said.

Bishop Minns told The Church of England Newspaper he served in a secretarial capacity as Archbishop Akinola’s amanuensis, and did not write the pastoral as claimed by the Church Times.

On Aug 20 CEN received a copy of Archbishop Akinola’s pastoral from the Church of Nigeria written using Microsoft word. A revised copy of the pastoral was sent out later that day. In its report on the pastoral the CEN noted that Archbishop Akinola was visiting his parishes in Northern Virginia at the time of the document’s release.

Using the Microsoft word feature “Track Changes”, changes to the original draft document as claimed by the Church Times can be observed, including the name of the registered user of the software used to edit the document.

While Bishop Minns is named as the registered owner of the software, there is no evidence that he was the author of the document—merely that it was typed on a machine whose copy of Microsoft Word was registered in his name.

Comment at Thinking Anglicans or Titusonenine

Lord Carey’s letter to The Church of England Newspaper questioning the rationale used to exclude the Anglican Mission in America [AMiA] from the 2008 Lambeth Conference has elicited strong words of support from American conservatives, as well as dark mutterings from aides to Dr. Rowan Williams.

In a letter to the editor published on June 1, Lord Carey questioned the explanation given by Conference Secretary Canon Kenneth Kearon in excluding the AMiA from Lambeth. “My opposition to the consecration of two AMiA bishops related to the setting up of Episcopal activity in the United States which I regarded as unconstitutional and unnecessary” Lord Carey wrote.

However, this was before the actions of General Convention in 2003 when the “Episcopal Church clearly signaled its abandonment of Communion norms, in spite of the warning of the Primates.”

“Everything has changed in the Anglican Communion as a result of the consecration of Gene Robinson” Lord Carey noted. He urged Dr. Williams not to regard his 2000 statements as “necessarily binding on him in the very different circumstances of 2007.”

AMiA Bishop Chuck Murphy welcomed Lord Carey’s words of support. The former Archbishop of Canterbury’s words “reflect not only his awareness that this crisis has now reached the breaking point for the Communion, but also that, perhaps, his initial harsh criticisms of our work and ‘intervention’ in response to this global crisis may now need to be modified somewhat, or even withdrawn, in the light of the unfolding developments of the last seven years,” Bishop Murphy told the CEN.

There was a “growing international consensus” that the crisis of faith and order within the Anglican Communion had the potential to destroy it. The AMiA’s “outside strategy” in responding to the crisis “has proved to be a most creative and effective model for addressing” the breakdown of faith and order, he said.

The Ugandan and Nigerian warnings that they could not attend the conference in all good conscience if the Robinson consecrating bishops were present was not an idle threat, he noted. “The Global South is firm in its stand that they will no longer accept business as usual,” Bishop Murphy said.

Comment on this story at the AACBlog.

Parish defections and litigation are continuing to mount in the United States, with five parishes quitting the Episcopal Church last month for oversight from Nigerian and Ugandan bishops.

Members of the Diocese of Colorado’s largest parish ratified the March decision by their rector the Rev. Donald Armstrong, and the vestry to join CANA.

On May 26 the Grace & St Stephen’s Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado announced that 370 of the parishes 822 members had caste ballots in the secession referendum, with 348 voting to leave and 22 to stay. The Diocese has condemned the vote, saying it was illegal and non-binding, arguing that while individuals may leave the Episcopal Church, congregations may not.

The congregation which claimed over 1500 communicants before the conflict between the parish and diocese reached a head in March, has divided with approximately three quarters of the worshippers loyal to the parish leadership and a quarter loyal to the diocese—meeting in a chapel of nearby Colorado College under the cure of an assistant priest of the parish who did not support the secession.

Litigation over the £9 million property between the parish and diocese is on-going.

CANA announced last week that three other US congregations had quit the Episcopal Church to join the Nigerian missionary district led by Bishop Martyn Minns. One of the Connecticut 6 parishes—a group of traditionalist parishes involved in a long-running dispute with diocesan Bishop Andrew Smith, quit the diocese on May 29.

Founded in 1754, before the creation of the Diocese of Connecticut, Trinity Church in Bristol will seek to retain its property, Bishop Minns said, while moving under Nigerian oversight.

Members of Holy Trinity Church in Garland, Texas, in the Diocese of Dallas, have withdrawn from the Episcopal Church, forming Holy Trinity Anglican Church. In Florida the parishioners and vicar of St. Cyprians Episcopal Church, a predominantly African-American congregation, have quit the diocese to form Christ the King Anglican Church in St. Augustine, led by their former priest in charge, the Rev. David Allert.

The parish at the center of the Panel of Reference’s report on the Diocese of Florida has also been forced out of its church buildings following a court order from a Florida judge.

Last month a court ordered the secessionist clergy and members of the Church of the Redeemer in Jacksonville led by the Rev. Neil Lebhar to vacate their property, turning it over to the control of Florida Bishop John Howard. Approximately 90 percent of the congregation has followed Mr. Lebhar, with only 10 families remaining at Redeemer under the supervision of a vicar appointed by the Diocese.

Gene Robinson is not coming to Lambeth. The New Hampshire bishop, CANA Bishop Martyn Minns and Bishop Chuck Murphy of the AMiA and his suffragans will not receive invitations to the July 16 to Aug 4 gathering in Canterbury of the bishops of the Anglican Communion, Canon Kenneth Kearon, the secretary of the 2008 Lambeth Conference said on May 22.

Invitations to the 2008 conference have been mailed to over 800 bishops by the Conference’s host, the Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. Rowan Williams. Invitations to two other diocesan bishops, including the controversial Bishop of Harare, Dr. Nolbert Kunonga, have been held pending further “consultation,” said Canon Kearon, the ACC secretary general.

Dr. Williams is “seeking further advice” on inviting Dr. Kunonga, Canon Kearon told The Church of England Newspaper but noted his case and that of “one or two others” had “nothing to do with the Windsor process.” In 2002 the EU banned Dr. Kunonga from travel to Europe in response to his complicity with the crimes of the regime of Zimbabwe strongman Robert Mugabe.

A spokesman for the ACC noted Bishop Robinson Cavalcanti of Recife would not be invited either. In 2005 Bishop Cavalcanti and 32 of his clergy were deposed by the Primate of Brazil for contumacy. They and over 90 percent of the communicants in the diocese transferred to the jurisdiction of the Province of the Southern Cone under the jurisdiction of Archbishop Gregory Venables.

In a letter accompanying the invitation, Dr. Williams stated he hoped the meeting would be “a place where we can try and get more clarity about the limits of our diversity and the means of deepening our Communion, so we can speak together with conviction and clarity to the world.”

He noted that Lambeth would not be “a formal Synod or Council of the bishops of the Communion” nor does attending the Conference commit a bishop to accept “the position of others as necessarily a legitimate expression of Anglican doctrine and discipline, or to any action that would compromise your conscience or the integrity of your local church.”

Dr. Williams said he had reserved the right “to withhold or withdraw invitations from bishops whose appointment, actions or manner of life have caused exceptionally serious division or scandal within the Communion.”

Canon Kearon stated there was “no question that Gene Robinson had been duly elected and consecrated” Bishop of New Hampshire in 2005. However, paragraph 133 of the Windsor Report recommends the Archbishop “exercise very considerable caution in inviting or admitting him to the councils of the Communion,” he said.

The “archbishop recognizes the widespread objections in many parts of the communion to [Bishop Robinson's] consecration and to his ministry,” said Canon Kearon. However, the “Archbishop intends to explore the possibility of inviting [Bishop Robinson] to Lambeth as a guest or observer,” he added.

The Bishops of the Anglican Mission in America would not be invited to Lambeth because of the decision taken by Archbishop George Carey in 2000. Archbishop Carey “wrote to them saying he could not recognize their ministry” and that their “consecrations were irregular,” Canon Kearon explained. This decision was “confirmed at Oporto” by the Primates in 2000 and the “decision was already fixed” by Dr. Williams’ predecessor.

The case of CANA Bishop Martyn Minns exhibits “no difference” from the AMiA and he falls into the same category, Canon Kearon said.

Dr. Williams has been under intense pressure to act upon the Lambeth invitations. While the Conference has no juridical powers, it is seen as the symbolic center of Anglican identity—and the arbiter of who is and is not an Anglican. The Primate of Canada, Archbishop Andrew Hutchison urged Dr. Williams to postpone Lambeth to forestall the political confrontation expected.

A number of American and British bishops had suggested they may boycott Lambeth should Bishop Robinson not be invited. However, on May 15 the Primate of the West Indies, Archbishop Drexel Gomez told The Church of England Newspaper the Global South Primates had written to Dr. Williams saying that if Bishop Robinson were invited to Lambeth, the Global South bishops would not attend.