VA. BILL WOULD ALTER CHURCH-OWNERSHIP RULES: From the Washington Post

[I admit this is anything but directly relevant, but it's fascinating. --Eve]

A bill before the Virginia Senate has alarmed the Episcopal Church and other mainline Protestant denominations that are deeply torn over the ordination of gay ministers and the blessing of same-sex marriages because, they say, the measure would give local congregations unprecedented powers to break away from their national denominations.

Several major church groups on Tuesday urged lawmakers to reject the bill, which they said would entangle state government in church politics.

The bill, now on the Senate floor, would allow congregants to vote to leave their denominations and keep their church buildings and land, unless a legally binding document such as a deed specified otherwise.

Many denominations have long had rules that prevent dissenting congregations from leaving the parent church and taking their land, buildings and other property with them. Since 1979, the U.S. Supreme Court and numerous other courts have upheld those rules in all but a few exceptional circumstances.

As a result, relatively few of the Episcopal congregations in Virginia and other states that vehemently object to the consecration of a gay bishop in New Hampshire have simply left the Episcopal Church USA. Instead, most have formed a network of disenchanted parishes that some call a church within a church, and they have tried to muster international pressure on the U.S. Episcopal hierarchy from the worldwide Anglican Communion.

Opponents of Senate Bill 1305, sponsored by Sen. William C. Mims (R-Loudoun), said it would be an unconstitutional intrusion of the government into that dispute. ...

Although Episcopal Church officials did not learn of the bill until the middle of last week, delegates to the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia's annual convention in Reston over the weekend passed a resolution opposing it, said Russell V. Palmore, the chancellor, or lawyer, of the diocese.

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posted by Eve at 3:40 PM VOTE

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