I’m not a lawyer, nor do I play one on TV. The basis of the ruling appears to be that CANA was not derived from TEC (p. 30). Seems to me that in revisiting this decision it could be argued before the district court that congregations belonging to ACNA meet the VSC’s criteria.
The past weeks have raised the obvious question towards ++Canterbury’s recent letter: “Whence the Fourth Moritorium? Whence the alternative pastoral oversight scheme?” Perhaps it is God’s will for the faithful in Virginia to consider the Savior’s words in Matthew 10 and shake the dust from their feet.
Kendall,
I’m not a lawyer either, but I think your heading is a bit misleading here. It tends to suggest that the high court favored TEC more than it actually did.
After all, the state supremes didn’t award the properties to TEC but just sent the case back to Fairfax Circuit Court to be retried on a different basis. I find the reasoning convoluted and unpersuasive behind ts ruling that the unique VA statute 57-9A was inapplicable because CANA wasn’t a “branch” of the pre-existing church body but of an outside group, i.e., the Anglican Church in Nigeria. But nonetheless, as a commenter noted on a related thread, footnote 12 may actually implicitly favor the departing churches.
I think the CANA churches still have a strong possibility of winning. But alas, now they will have to spend more time in legal limbo and lots and lots of money simply to retain the property that is rightfully theirs. This is a set back for everyone, except for the lawyers, who alone have something to gain from this mess dragging on into round two.
I’m not a lawyer, nor do I play one on TV. The basis of the ruling appears to be that CANA was not derived from TEC (p. 30). Seems to me that in revisiting this decision it could be argued before the district court that congregations belonging to ACNA meet the VSC’s criteria.
The past weeks have raised the obvious question towards ++Canterbury’s recent letter: “Whence the Fourth Moritorium? Whence the alternative pastoral oversight scheme?” Perhaps it is God’s will for the faithful in Virginia to consider the Savior’s words in Matthew 10 and shake the dust from their feet.
Kendall,
I’m not a lawyer either, but I think your heading is a bit misleading here. It tends to suggest that the high court favored TEC more than it actually did.
After all, the state supremes didn’t award the properties to TEC but just sent the case back to Fairfax Circuit Court to be retried on a different basis. I find the reasoning convoluted and unpersuasive behind ts ruling that the unique VA statute 57-9A was inapplicable because CANA wasn’t a “branch” of the pre-existing church body but of an outside group, i.e., the Anglican Church in Nigeria. But nonetheless, as a commenter noted on a related thread, footnote 12 may actually implicitly favor the departing churches.
I think the CANA churches still have a strong possibility of winning. But alas, now they will have to spend more time in legal limbo and lots and lots of money simply to retain the property that is rightfully theirs. This is a set back for everyone, except for the lawyers, who alone have something to gain from this mess dragging on into round two.
David Handy+