NO NEED FOR LAWYERS CRAWLING OVER CHURCH PROPERTY
By Julian Mann
The Church of England faces a choice over churches wanting to leave it whether to join the Roman Catholics or to form an orthodox Province in the UK: it can behave with pompous officiousness like TEC going to court over church property or it can deploy some generous lateral thinking for the sake of Christ’s mission.
The Bishop of Southwark’s recent comments in his presidential address to his diocesan synod, helpfully reported by Anglican Mainstream, about the practicalities of Anglo-Catholic parish churches going over to Rome are highly revealing. They show that the thoughts of the more managerially-inclined liberals in the hierarchy are already turning to the legalities.
He said that because there have been ‘some wild ideas’ going around leading to questions being asked of his office, he thought it ‘wise to seek a little legal advice on the implications there might be for the Diocese and its Parishes if any Priest or group of lay people wished to become Roman Catholics’.
The legal eagles came back with some comforting news: ‘No Priest or group of laity has the right to take church property with them when they change denominations, for a Diocese holds such property in trust for the mission and ministry of the Church of England to all the people of its parishes and this duty of care would continue.’
In the case of a parish church wanting to transfer to another denomination, a scheme under the Pastoral Measure, or specific legislation enacted for the purpose, would be needed and this could ‘only be done with the goodwill of the diocese’.
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