BINGHAMTON, NY: Hearing Friday to decide local church ownership

By William Moyer, Staff Writer
http://www.pressconnects.com/article/20081210/NEWS01/812100396
December 10, 2008

State Supreme Court Judge Ferris D. Lebous will be asked Friday to decide whether a local church or a regional diocese owns property on Conklin Avenue, which is occupied by Church of the Good Shepherd.

The decision, whether rendered Friday or more likely reserved by Lebous for a future date, could be a precedent in ongoing legal disputes in New York state and elsewhere between the Episcopal Church and individual congregations who've withdrawn from the national denomination.

That split came when V. Gene Robinson, a self-avowed homosexual, was ordained a bishop in 2003.

Already, a state appeals court sided with the denomination in a similar case involving the Rochester diocese and a congregation in Irondequoit, which withdrew in January 2006. All Saints Church claimed it was entitled to church property, but the court ruled in October in favor of the diocese.

Good Shepherd's attorney, Raymond Dague of Syracuse, acknowledged the decision doesn't help his case, but he stated in court documents that a 1979 decision by a national Episcopal convention, which was cited as the reason for favoring the diocese, wasn't adopted according to church law.

"This is David versus Goliath," said Dague, who filed his client's documents Tuesday. "We're out-financed; we're outnumbered. They have an almost unlimited budget to crush this little church."

Good Shepherd's pastor, the Rev. Matthew Kennedy, said the diocese is wrong and local parishioners are hoping and praying for a favorable decision.

"We decided to defend ourselves while we have means to do so," said Kennedy. "We've prepared a defense and prepared a plan in case the church is forced to vacate the property."

Good Shepherd's vestry voted in November 2007 to withdraw from the regional diocese, which is headquartered in Syracuse. Instead, the church affiliated itself with an Anglican communion that adheres to orthodox doctrine on homosexuality and other teachings.

Two other churches in central New York also withdrew from the diocese since Robinson's ordination.

St. Andrew's in Vestal vacated its buildings rather than get snarled in a costly legal battle with the diocese. The congregation and its pastor, the Rev. Anthony Seel, moved to a Baptist building in Vestal. The other church in downtown Syracuse dropped its legal battle and surrendered its buildings.

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