The ongoing division within The Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion “is of the first magnitude,” according to Fairfax, Va., Circuit Court Judge Randy I. Bellows, who issued a preliminary ruling April 3 in favor of 11 congregations that left the Diocese of Virginia after holding parish votes in 2006.
 
A rarely used Virginia statute enacted in the aftermath of the Civil War permits individual congregations to determine by majority vote what to do with local church property in the event of a schism. Lawyers for The Episcopal Church argued that Virginia Statute 57-9 was meant only in the event of a denomination-wide split, and the local parish defections did not meet that threshold.
 
“The Court agrees that it was major divisions such as those within the Methodist and Presbyterian churches that prompted the passage of 57-9. However, it blinks at reality to characterize the ongoing division within the diocese, [The Episcopal Church], and the Anglican Communion as anything but a division of the first magnitude.” The conclusion of the 88-page decision goes on to describe the “the rapidity with which [The Episcopal Church’s] problems became that of the Anglican Communion, and the consequent impact—in some cases the extraordinary impact—on its provinces around the world.”
 
Judge Bellows will hear oral arguments on the constitutionality of the state statute on May 28. The Episcopal Church maintains that the state law is in conflict with U.S. Supreme Court decisions which grant wide latitude to the constitution and canons of hierarchical church denominations in the event of a property dispute. The so-called Dennis Canon states that title to all local church property belongs to the diocese in which it is geographically resident.
 
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