The Rt. Rev. David AndersonBeloved in Christ,
Among the many things that come across my desk from various sources around the world was this interesting item from The Episcopal Church (TEC):
"As a follow up to the request by the Office of Pastoral Development to list any uninvited interventions/incursions in your Diocese, it is important to name not only those that are happening at present, but also what has already occurred and when. The history of this behavior is important to note, even if groups have already left to form another kind of "Anglican" church and/or retaining property. Thank you for your help in this.
The Rev. Canon C. K. Robertson, Ph.D.
Canon to the Presiding Bishop & Primate"
Does this mean that the TEC bishop has to inform on the Roman Catholic bishop who is performing uninvited services within the geography of a TEC diocese? No, of course we don't think this is the case; although the language is a bit sloppy, what TEC means is just Anglican bishops. The idea of incursions from Africa or elsewhere has really annoyed TEC because they couldn't stop it, and then when it did stop with the appointment of resident US citizens as bishops and the formation of the Anglican Church in North America, things got worse for TEC and their cohorts, the Anglican Church in Canada.
Now TEC wants to compile a book of "Infractions, Incursions and Non-invited Events" in THEIR yard. If they wish to start their list, they could begin with the Anglican Mission in the Americas and go back about 10 years - but if they wish to be even more comprehensive, they can go back to the formation of the Reformed Episcopal Church in the 1870's. This could be quite an extensive project!
On a different note, we see that St. James Anglican Church, Newport Beach, CA (my former parish, from which I retired in 2002) is having to petition the California Supreme Court to overturn an adverse decision by the Court of Appeals. St. James has been trying to have an honest trial of both fact and law, and the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles and the national Episcopal Church have been trying to prevent exactly that, arguing that the property belongs to TEC because they say so, and incredibly, both the Appeals Court and the state Supreme Court seem to be buying their claims without actually reviewing the facts.
If the courts defer to the internal pronouncements of a church and surrender their duty to decide on neutral principles of law, then the court is in effect giving preference to one religion, or version of one religion, over another. The only way the court can avoid entangling itself in the non establishment clause of the Bill of Rights, and avoid giving preference to one religion over another, is to look at the clear and public documents pertaining to the organization of a church, the manner in which the property is held by history of acquisition, title, deed, encumbrance, etc. This is exactly what the South Carolina Supreme Court did.
By contrast, the Supreme Courts of California and New York seem to have taken the internal pronouncements of the church as a factor which trumps all other "neutral principles" and evidence regarding the title to church property. This was never the intent of the US Supreme Court in Jones v. Wolf.
If a diocese wants to demonstrate its ownership, let the title be held clearly by the diocese, and let the diocese assume liability for the property. Then a court can easily see that the neutral view, when looking at the documents, indicates the proper and real owner.
The problem for St. James is that the Court of Appeals, acting on a motion by the Diocese, directed the lower court to move to summary judgment in favor of the Diocese. In so doing, the courts simply ruled on the Diocese's statement of the facts rather than a review of the actual facts of the case and the documents at issue. This is an extraordinary and unprecedented miscarriage of justice and due process.
Included in the documents that the Diocese wishes to thus suppress is a letter from Bishop Borsch, then diocesan of Los Angeles, waiving claim on the property. The parish is asking the California Supreme Court to send the case back to lower court for a fair trial of fact and law. Enough of TEC's effort to suppress the truth and avoid the consequences of that letter the bishop gave to the parish years ago. Pray that justice might be found.
Blessings and peace in Christ Jesus,
The Rt. Rev. David C. Anderson, Sr.
President and CEO, American Anglican Council
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