The first Canadian settlement between ACoC and ANiC has been approved, as the two Ottawa ANiC parishes have ratified the agreed settlement with the diocese. ANiC's press release is here; the diocese's news release is here
The settlement conforms to the template that I have been saying for some time would work in a diocese in which more than one parish has left. One ANiC parish keeps its building; the other one leaves it. The one that keeps its building pays the diocese "a substantial sum of money". Meanwhile ANiC states that "By agreement, precise details of the division of assets between the parishes and diocese are to remain confidential." What that means, we may infer, is that the diocese will pay out some money to St. Alban's, which will provide a nice start to their building fund. The diocese's insistence on a confidentiality agreement conforms with what has been suggested to me by a lawyer friend with reason to know how a rational diocese might approach a situation like this. A diocese would not want it to be known that it is paying out money to a departing parish, so it would insist on a confidentiality agreement, so that the settlement may be described in a way that obscures the fact of such a payment. That is why a multi-parish settlement can be easier than a single-parish ones; the financial implications can be blurred so that ACoC is not seen to be doing anything that might amount to a significant concession to ANiC.
A fillip I didn't think of is that the departing congregations have been required to change their names. This might seem to be rather unnecessarily ruthless of the diocese, but it allows the diocese to maintain its formal position. The parish of St. George's has not left the diocese; rather it has been disestablished, and its building sold to a worshipping group with a different name. St Alban's parish has not left; rather its clergy have left, apparently starting some sectarian congregation with a different name, worshipping in a different building. Anglican worship carries on in the same building, with all present St. Alban's members invited to continue worshipping there. (Where they will find a congregation for the "continuing" ACoC St. Alban's is another question, but one to worry about another day.) By returning Anglican Social Services to the building, the diocese maintains the pretext that it wants it because it has use of it.
It's important that things are set up so that both sides may maintain their formal position about the dispute, to validate their narrative. Most of us normal people, upon finalizing such a settlement, would thank God and move on. But there are always some ditchers, particularly in a group of people with strong beliefs like ANiC, who are insistent on carrying on the fighting and demonstrating to all that they won the settlement. Thus Kate Sanderson, at the always-irresponsible Anglican Essentials blog, insists that the by settling the diocese acknowledged that St. Alban's had the right to their building, which it does not, as if anyone with any sense cares now. (She also risks breaking the confidentiality agreement by claiming that the percentage asset division in the settlement: 40/60 ANiC/ACoC if you want to know. So much for an agreement about confidentiality with ANiC!)
Even without knowing the amounts of the monies being exchanged, it may safely be judged that both sides are better off than if they had been engaged in a lawsuit since the time the congregations left. +Chapman deserves credit for acting as a faithful steward of that which was entrusted to him, avoiding the needless squandering of hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees.
Could others follow the example of this settlement? The problem is finding a rational ACoC diocese. In New Westminster it's rather late, and neither side would seem likely to surrender possession of St. John's Shaughnessy voluntarily in any case, while a sensible settlement would involve selling it and splitting the proceeds. In Niagara the sensible thing would be to sell Good Shepherd (which would be a prudent move anyway) and divide the spoils, and then split ownership of the other two properties . But +Niagara does not seem to view the situation rationally anyway; the lawsuit is already well under way so hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees have already been squandered; and the provocative presence of Charlie Masters+ in the diocese inhibits any settlement -- particularly one in which he retains his building.
Showing posts with label Property Litigation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Property Litigation. Show all posts
Monday, February 14, 2011
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
The Strange Death of the Original-Principles Trust (Pt 2)
Kelleher J.’s approach is to treat the application of the neutral principles of law, which is step one of the process, as both beginning and end of it. The cases he cites in support of his approach are all irrelevant to the case at hand. Two cases are cited in support of the proposition that questions of church doctrine are inappropriate subjects for judicial determination. Kelleher J. notes in particular that one of these cases referred approvingly to the U. S. Supreme Court’s groundbreaking 1979 decision in Jones v. Wolf (8). However it is not necessary to look to cases relying on American constitutional law in support of the doctrine that Anglo-Canadian courts ordinarily refrain from determining issues of church doctrine. That also is a centuries-old common-law doctrine, and the inquiry into fundamental original doctrines is a carefully carved out exception to it, as Professor Ogilvie explains in her text. Kelleher J. further cites Protection of the Holy Virgin Russian Orthodox Church (9), where the Quebec Court of Appeal declined a request for a declaration that to be a member of the parish, a person must observe the teachings of the church. There was no trust argument in that case so the refusal of the court to get involved in matters of doctrine has no relevance here. The portion of the trial court decision cited an Ontario Court of Appeal decision in Balkou v. Gouleff (11). In that case the court was asked to determine whether church doctrine forbade membership in Communist organizations. Again, this is not a church property case and has no bearing on the fundamental-principle doctrine.
The oddest citation in support of this approach comes in paragraph 252, where Kelleher J. cites a statement by Burton J.A. in Itter v. Howe (1896)(12) in support of the proposition that “[t]he notion of civil courts deferring to ecclesiastical authority on questions of doctrine has deep provenance in Canada.” As a refutation of the fundamental-principles doctrine, this reference is negated more than adequately by Kelleher J. himself in paragraphs 268 and 269, where he discusses the case and demonstrates that the fundamental-principle rule was applied in it. The dissidents lost in Itter v. Howe, but the principle itself was recognized --as it always has been until Bentley v. New Westminster was released.
The other argument Kelleher J. uses is that trust doctrine does not apply in the case of a hierarchical church such as the Anglican Church, which was an elaborate and complicated set of rules, procedures, and authorities. This appears to be an acceptance of the defendants’ novel argument, also derivative of American categorizations, that the trust doctrine applies only in congregational churches, and not hierarchical ones. I have not been able to find any case law cited by either Kelleher J. or the defendants in support of this proposition; I believe none exists. The doctrine has always applied to hierarchical and non-hierarchical churches; to churches with elaborately constructed internal mechanisms and those with no written statements of doctrine at all. The analysis has been applied to eastern Orthodox churches which are more hierarchical than the Anglican Church. It has been applied to the Methodist Episcopal Church in the 1830s, a hierarchical church within the legal meaning of the term and one with a more detailed and precise set of rules and internal procedures than Anglicans have. There is no basis for this argument in either precedent or logic; the ill that the fundamental-principles doctrine attempts to remedy is the same whether the abandonment has occurred by an arbitrary decision in a single congregation with no written doctrinal statement or a thoroughly debated decision in a denomination with 500 pages of constitution and canons.
What would impel Kelleher J. to reject the existing doctrine so brazenly? I want to discuss this because orthodox Christians succumb all too easily to the temptation, and I use the word literally, to attribute all adverse judicial decisions to the implacable hostility of the secular world and its rejection of the truth in Christ. It must be acknowledged that in any case where judicial bias, open or covert, influences a decision, the probability is great that the relevant bias will be against orthodox Christianity. However in Bentley the possibility that the adverse decision was actuated by bias can be completely dismissed. A companion issue in the case involved the disposition of the Chun bequest, a $2.2 million building fund claimed by both a dissenting and a successor ACoC congregation. Without discussing the trust issues there, it may be said that the choice of beneficiary was something close to an act of pure equitable discretion. The departing ACNA congregation was awarded control of the Chun bequest. It is impossible that a judge motivated by hostility to orthodox doctrine would have made that decision.
The reason that the place of the fundamental-principles doctrine could be seen in advance of this litigation to be somewhat precarious is that it has an archaic air to it. Aspects of it seem to belong to a bygone age, to a time when any educated English gentleman, of whatever religious belief, who might find himself on the bench could be expected to know the basic doctrines of not only the Church of England but the major sectarian groups (and even of “Papists”, as they were described in one of the major early House of Lords precedents). Like the law lords in the case marking the high water mark of the doctrine, Free Church of Scotland v. Overtoun (13) (see Wikipedia entry), a judge could be expected to engage in learned discussion on the degree of significance of an alteration of the doctrine of double predestination by the adoption of the statement that “God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” In a post-Christian age, we cannot expect judges to bring with them that kind of expertise. Nor are Christian churches the only religious institutions to which the doctrine applies. In the English case of Varsani v Jesani , a Hindu sect’s founder was believed to be the incarnation of the Supreme Being, and a division arose over the extent to which his successor also enjoyed divine status. Carnwith J. was faced with the task of determining which faction (if either) had deviated from the sect’s original fundamental principles, in a sect with no written doctrinal statement that could be adverted to. Understandably, he balked, and found a solution in a statutory scheme that allowed division of properties between the factions. There is no equivalent statutory provision in Canada, so a judge here would have to make that challenging factual determination.
The necessary entanglement of the state in church affairs of the fundamental-doctrines rule leads activist judges to look for some way to extinguish it. The strength of this sentiment may be seem from the reaction to the decision by Don Hutchinson, general legal counsel for the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada (EFC). It is churches like EFC members who derive the most benefit from a doctrine protecting established orthodoxy. Despite this, Hutchinson said “he found it appropriate that Justice Kelleher "respected the religious freedom of the Anglican communion" by allowing internal Anglican processes to resolve internal Anglican disputes. "We don't want the courts or government making final decisions on the beliefs, practice and polity of a church."
So far so good as to the chances of a successful appeal by the ANiC churches, who at the time of writing are in a discernment process to determine whether they should appeal. (A notice of appeal has been filed to meet the deadline.) However, as we shall subsequently see, the situation gets much stickier when we look at ANiC's ability to show that the ACoC has indeed violated the original principles doctrine as the coirts have applied it.
NOTES
(8) (1979), 443 U.S. 595, 1979 U.S. LEXIS 16
(9) (1st ed., at 209).
(10) [2001] O.J. No. 438 (S.C.); varied 2002 CanLII 3570 (ON C.A.), 30 B.L.R. (3d) 315, 167 O.A.C. 138
(11) (1989) 68 O.R. (2d) 574.
(12) (1896), 23 O.A.R. 256, [1896] O.J. No. 31 (QL) (C.A.)
(13) [1904] AC 515 (H.L.)
The oddest citation in support of this approach comes in paragraph 252, where Kelleher J. cites a statement by Burton J.A. in Itter v. Howe (1896)(12) in support of the proposition that “[t]he notion of civil courts deferring to ecclesiastical authority on questions of doctrine has deep provenance in Canada.” As a refutation of the fundamental-principles doctrine, this reference is negated more than adequately by Kelleher J. himself in paragraphs 268 and 269, where he discusses the case and demonstrates that the fundamental-principle rule was applied in it. The dissidents lost in Itter v. Howe, but the principle itself was recognized --as it always has been until Bentley v. New Westminster was released.
The other argument Kelleher J. uses is that trust doctrine does not apply in the case of a hierarchical church such as the Anglican Church, which was an elaborate and complicated set of rules, procedures, and authorities. This appears to be an acceptance of the defendants’ novel argument, also derivative of American categorizations, that the trust doctrine applies only in congregational churches, and not hierarchical ones. I have not been able to find any case law cited by either Kelleher J. or the defendants in support of this proposition; I believe none exists. The doctrine has always applied to hierarchical and non-hierarchical churches; to churches with elaborately constructed internal mechanisms and those with no written statements of doctrine at all. The analysis has been applied to eastern Orthodox churches which are more hierarchical than the Anglican Church. It has been applied to the Methodist Episcopal Church in the 1830s, a hierarchical church within the legal meaning of the term and one with a more detailed and precise set of rules and internal procedures than Anglicans have. There is no basis for this argument in either precedent or logic; the ill that the fundamental-principles doctrine attempts to remedy is the same whether the abandonment has occurred by an arbitrary decision in a single congregation with no written doctrinal statement or a thoroughly debated decision in a denomination with 500 pages of constitution and canons.
What would impel Kelleher J. to reject the existing doctrine so brazenly? I want to discuss this because orthodox Christians succumb all too easily to the temptation, and I use the word literally, to attribute all adverse judicial decisions to the implacable hostility of the secular world and its rejection of the truth in Christ. It must be acknowledged that in any case where judicial bias, open or covert, influences a decision, the probability is great that the relevant bias will be against orthodox Christianity. However in Bentley the possibility that the adverse decision was actuated by bias can be completely dismissed. A companion issue in the case involved the disposition of the Chun bequest, a $2.2 million building fund claimed by both a dissenting and a successor ACoC congregation. Without discussing the trust issues there, it may be said that the choice of beneficiary was something close to an act of pure equitable discretion. The departing ACNA congregation was awarded control of the Chun bequest. It is impossible that a judge motivated by hostility to orthodox doctrine would have made that decision.
The reason that the place of the fundamental-principles doctrine could be seen in advance of this litigation to be somewhat precarious is that it has an archaic air to it. Aspects of it seem to belong to a bygone age, to a time when any educated English gentleman, of whatever religious belief, who might find himself on the bench could be expected to know the basic doctrines of not only the Church of England but the major sectarian groups (and even of “Papists”, as they were described in one of the major early House of Lords precedents). Like the law lords in the case marking the high water mark of the doctrine, Free Church of Scotland v. Overtoun (13) (see Wikipedia entry), a judge could be expected to engage in learned discussion on the degree of significance of an alteration of the doctrine of double predestination by the adoption of the statement that “God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” In a post-Christian age, we cannot expect judges to bring with them that kind of expertise. Nor are Christian churches the only religious institutions to which the doctrine applies. In the English case of Varsani v Jesani , a Hindu sect’s founder was believed to be the incarnation of the Supreme Being, and a division arose over the extent to which his successor also enjoyed divine status. Carnwith J. was faced with the task of determining which faction (if either) had deviated from the sect’s original fundamental principles, in a sect with no written doctrinal statement that could be adverted to. Understandably, he balked, and found a solution in a statutory scheme that allowed division of properties between the factions. There is no equivalent statutory provision in Canada, so a judge here would have to make that challenging factual determination.
The necessary entanglement of the state in church affairs of the fundamental-doctrines rule leads activist judges to look for some way to extinguish it. The strength of this sentiment may be seem from the reaction to the decision by Don Hutchinson, general legal counsel for the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada (EFC). It is churches like EFC members who derive the most benefit from a doctrine protecting established orthodoxy. Despite this, Hutchinson said “he found it appropriate that Justice Kelleher "respected the religious freedom of the Anglican communion" by allowing internal Anglican processes to resolve internal Anglican disputes. "We don't want the courts or government making final decisions on the beliefs, practice and polity of a church."
So far so good as to the chances of a successful appeal by the ANiC churches, who at the time of writing are in a discernment process to determine whether they should appeal. (A notice of appeal has been filed to meet the deadline.) However, as we shall subsequently see, the situation gets much stickier when we look at ANiC's ability to show that the ACoC has indeed violated the original principles doctrine as the coirts have applied it.
NOTES
(8) (1979), 443 U.S. 595, 1979 U.S. LEXIS 16
(9) (1st ed., at 209).
(10) [2001] O.J. No. 438 (S.C.); varied 2002 CanLII 3570 (ON C.A.), 30 B.L.R. (3d) 315, 167 O.A.C. 138
(11) (1989) 68 O.R. (2d) 574.
(12) (1896), 23 O.A.R. 256, [1896] O.J. No. 31 (QL) (C.A.)
(13) [1904] AC 515 (H.L.)
The Strange Death of the Original-Principles Trust (Pt 1)
In the last decade, congregations in the Anglican diocese of New Westminster have had to respond to the heterodox doctrinal positions taken by the diocese and its Bishop Michael Ingham. One option was to separate from the Anglican Church of Canada ("ACoC") and affiliate with an orthodox Anglican province overseas. They might then wonder what property rights their congregations would retain. There was a rule of law on the subject on which they might have thought they could rely. It has been in place in the United Kingdom and Canada for over 150 years. Its validity had never been called into question. It had been taken for granted as a valid rule of law in the most recent cases on the subject: in Scotland in 2005 (1), in England in 1998 (2), in the Supreme Court of Canada in 1970 (3), and in British Columbia itself in 1981 (4). It has been summarized by Professor Ogilvie, in her text on church law, as follows:
In Bentley v. New Westminster, (available free at http://www.canlii.org/en/bc/bcsc/doc/2009/2009bcsc1608/2009bcsc1608.html) (6) Mr Justice Stephen Kelleher, deciding ownership of the property of 4 orthodox Anglican congregations who had left the diocese, came to the surprising conclusion that this rule of law no longer existed. Or at least that he was able to decide a question of ownership where departure from fundamental doctrines was alleged while ignoring the rule, which amounts to the same thing. We have some detailed eyewitness accounts of the trial and can reconstruct how the justice was led to this novel conclusion, and they testify to the value of audacity in litigation strategy; the defendant diocese simply denied that any such doctrine existed.
Reading Kelleher J.’s legal analysis (beginning at para. 247), we can see that he has gotten off track, very early in his analysis, when he summarizes the defendant diocese’s position:
First the neutral principles of property law are applied, then, if it is alleged that the title holders at law have abandoned the original fundamental principles for the furtherance of which the property is held, the special original-principles trust test is applied. That’s the law of Canada.
NOTES
(1) Free Church Of Scotland v. General Assembly Of The Free Church Of Scotland [2005] ScotCS CSOH_46
(2) Varsani v Jesani [1998] EWCA Civ 630 (3 April 1998); http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/1998/630.html
(3) Hofer v. Hofer, [1970] S.C.R. 958, 1970 CanLII 161 (S.C.C.), 73 W.W.R. (N.S.) 644
(4) Chong v. Lee, 1981 CanLII 732 (BC S.C.), 29 B.C.L.R. 13
(5) M. H. Ogilvie, Religious Institutions and the Law in Canada (Toronto: Irwin Law, 2nd ed., 2003, at 293-94
(6) 2009 BCSC 1608 (CanLII), http://www.canlii.org/en/bc/bcsc/doc/2009/2009bcsc1608/2009bcsc1608.html
(7) Ogilvie, (1st ed., 1996,) at 211.
TO BE CONTINUED
It is a well-settled principle of law that the property of a religious institution must be held and applied to the original purposes for which that institution was founded, that is, for the original "trust". Such property cannot be redirected to other purposes by a mere majority of members, and where a majority decides upon a diversion, the property remains in trust for the dissenting minority (even one person) who adheres to the original trust for which the property was given. (5)There are a number of qualifications that need to be applied to this statement of law, most importantly that it is only the upholding of those doctrines that can be classified as fundamental that form the original trust, but that the rule of law existed has never been in dispute.
In Bentley v. New Westminster, (available free at http://www.canlii.org/en/bc/bcsc/doc/2009/2009bcsc1608/2009bcsc1608.html) (6) Mr Justice Stephen Kelleher, deciding ownership of the property of 4 orthodox Anglican congregations who had left the diocese, came to the surprising conclusion that this rule of law no longer existed. Or at least that he was able to decide a question of ownership where departure from fundamental doctrines was alleged while ignoring the rule, which amounts to the same thing. We have some detailed eyewitness accounts of the trial and can reconstruct how the justice was led to this novel conclusion, and they testify to the value of audacity in litigation strategy; the defendant diocese simply denied that any such doctrine existed.
Reading Kelleher J.’s legal analysis (beginning at para. 247), we can see that he has gotten off track, very early in his analysis, when he summarizes the defendant diocese’s position:
the defendants contend that the issues in dispute can be resolved by reference to statutes and canon law, and that it is unnecessary to turn to trust principles....What the defendants advance is akin to the "neutral principles of law" approach that American courts routinely apply in resolving church property disputes....Kelleher J. goes on to explain this so-called neutral principles of law approach, citing a recent California case:
The court should consider sources such as the deeds to the property in dispute, the local church’s articles of incorporation, the general church’s constitution, canons, and rules, and relevant statutes, including statutes specifically concerning religious property, such as [charitable corporations legislation].The reader’s first reaction will be to wonder what a principle of law developed by American courts in order to bring American church property law into compliance with the First Amendment to the American constitution by avoiding excessive entanglement of church and state has to do with the application of the well-established church property law of British Columbia. Kelleher J. "acknowledges that the neutral principles of law approach is a consequence of the First Amendment’s separation of church and state" in para. 249. But upon further consideration, this first reaction, that we are faced here with a pure doctrinal innovation based upon an arbitrary transplanting of American law, is misplaced. The neutral principles of law approach is not a new American approach. Properly understood, it is not an alternative to the Anglo-Canadian fundamental-purposes trust approach. The approaches are complementary, and have heretofore coexisted. Anglo-Canadian law, although having no need of the name, has always applied the "neutral principles of law" approach to answer the first question in any property dispute: who owns the property? And further, where necessary, do the holders of legal title hold the property on trust, express or implied, for some other entity within the denomination? And then, once these questions have been decided, once the "neutral principles of law" approach has been exhausted, where there has been a division within a church, there remains the question of whether one side of the division has abandoned the fundamental doctrines upon which the church has been based. For, to quote Prof. Ogilvie again,
"...regardless of denomination or polity, where a congregation or denomination decides to change its fundamental doctrinal standards from those for which the property was given, the property is to be held on trust for those members who adhere to the original standard." (7)11 Canadian cases are cited for this proposition, and more could be found, without even counting cases from Great Britain where the doctrine was formed and evolved.
First the neutral principles of property law are applied, then, if it is alleged that the title holders at law have abandoned the original fundamental principles for the furtherance of which the property is held, the special original-principles trust test is applied. That’s the law of Canada.
NOTES
(1) Free Church Of Scotland v. General Assembly Of The Free Church Of Scotland [2005] ScotCS CSOH_46
(2) Varsani v Jesani [1998] EWCA Civ 630 (3 April 1998); http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/1998/630.html
(3) Hofer v. Hofer, [1970] S.C.R. 958, 1970 CanLII 161 (S.C.C.), 73 W.W.R. (N.S.) 644
(4) Chong v. Lee, 1981 CanLII 732 (BC S.C.), 29 B.C.L.R. 13
(5) M. H. Ogilvie, Religious Institutions and the Law in Canada (Toronto: Irwin Law, 2nd ed., 2003, at 293-94
(6) 2009 BCSC 1608 (CanLII), http://www.canlii.org/en/bc/bcsc/doc/2009/2009bcsc1608/2009bcsc1608.html
(7) Ogilvie, (1st ed., 1996,) at 211.
TO BE CONTINUED
Friday, May 22, 2009
Michael Ingham "In Conflict" with the Truth
The Diocese of New Westminster filed and proudly published for the world on its website last week its Introduction to the case in Bentley v. Diocese of New Westminster, in which oral arguments start next week. One of the arguments which the diocese and named co-defendant +Michael Ingham make is that +Ingham's approval of same-sex blessings is fully authorized under the rules of the Anglican Church of Canada, or as they put it in paragraph 11 of their introduction, "entirely consistent with the Church structures." Now watch their hands closely. They say that "The General Synod resolved in 2007 that "the blessing of same-sex unions is consistent with the core doctrine of the Anglican Church of Canada." "
They wish.
Now there's two -- let's just call them "inaccuracies" for the moment -- in this statement, which purports to be a direct quote from a GS resolution. The substantively less important one irks me the most, because it represents either reprehensible sloppiness in stating important, easily ascertainable facts in crucial, showcase make-your-first-impression pleadings in a case in which millions of dollars and the futures of two major religions are on the table, or a sneaking in of a deliberate misstatement to try to mislead the Court into coming to a false conclusion of fact.
The corresponding wording in the resolution -- A186 -- that was actually passed is "the blessing of same-sex unions is not in conflict with the core doctrine... of the Anglican Church of Canada." (More about this ellipsis later).
Consistent with. Not in conflict with. What's the diff?
Well go to dictionary.com and you'll see a number of definitions for "consistent" but the main ones all start with some form of the concept of "agreement". "Having agreement with", "Being agreeable to". Suppose you ask your buddy, "So how's your wife with that idea of yours of going out for dinner and drinks once a month with your old girlfriend, just as 'old friends?" Do you draw different conclusions about what's going on if he says "No prob. She agrees with it" than if he pauses and says "We're not in conflict about it"?
You see +Ingham wants to create the impression that the ACoC has said it's all hunky-dory with SSBs, that they're agreeable to the Church's system of doctrine in all its fullness. But it hasn't debased itself that far yet. One of the things it has said is that SSBs aren't in conflict with "core doctrine" because they have nothing to do with 'core doctrine', which concerns an entirely separate set of matters. The GS 2007 resolutions start by accepting some of the main premises of the 2005 St. Michael's Report, by the Primate's Theological Commission, one of which is that "core doctrine" is a relatively small area of doctrine containing the crucial good news of the nature of God and the salvivic good news in Jesus Christ. Same-sex blessings aren't in conflict with core doctrine; neither would be officially authorizing rites blessing pornography festivals or all-weekend bar crawls. That doesn't mean either rite would be consistent with Anglican doctrine in its entirety -- or legal on the Anglican church. Such rites would be illegal just as +Ingham's SSBs are illegal, their authorization being beyond his authority.
This misquotation is the smaller part in consequence of the two falsehoods in New Westminster's statement, but it bothers me more because it's either a cheap and sneaky act of attempted deception or an example of gross lawyerly laziness and sloppiness. And if it's the latter, ANiC if it loses will end up paying two-thirds of the cost of the time billed for this little piece of incompetence.
The other lie in the quotation of the GS resolution is one of omission. The actual resolution referred to "core doctrine in the sense of being credal". (BTW no one seems quite sure whether it should be "credal" or "creedal".) That is, core doctrine defined even more narrowly than I have described above, as the affirmations of the great creeds of the early church. As the St. Michael's Report said, "The determination of this question will not hinder or impair our common affirmation of the historic creeds." Which is all quite true, bit hardly any kind of addition to our ecclesiastical knowledge. No, Athanasius and the others didn't find it necessary to put anything in their creeds about homosexuals not being able to marry. Which has nothing to do with whether SSBs are allowable under Anglican doctrine as a whole. The St. Michael's Report said no, obviously not. They're inconsistent with the Church's teaching about sexuality. General Synod 2007 defeated a motion to permit dioceses to perform SSBs. For some reason New Westminster's introduction to the case doesn't tell you these things.
And it's kind of funny that +Michael Ingham (treating the filings of his counsel as his own statements) doesn't seem to know the wording of this resolution. It's not like he wasn't there at the time it was debated. The last two amendments fooling around with the wording of the motion before the final vote -- +Michael Ingham moved one and seconded the other.
Don't get me wrong. The question of whether +Ingham acted legally, illegally, irregularly, prematurely, deconstructionally or postmodernly ain't gonna make a difference in this case. The truth is that the Anglican Church of Canada is so chaotically organized, conceptually incoherent, and inhabited by a spirit of lawlessness that there is nobody who can give an authoritative ruling whether diocesan authorized SSBs are legal or not -- and no means of stopping or disciplining any bishop who simply defied such a ruling if it were given. The ACoC is an ecclesial jungle governed by the law thereof.
But remember when +Cowan of British Columbia sneakily used the quiet of an agreed truce and mediation period to have the locks changed and an alarm system installed and had to be ordered by a judge the next day to hand over the keys and codes and stop tampering with other people's property? Sometimes it's the little things, not the gross and sensational abuses and power grabs, that tell you what kind of people you're dealing with.
They wish.
Now there's two -- let's just call them "inaccuracies" for the moment -- in this statement, which purports to be a direct quote from a GS resolution. The substantively less important one irks me the most, because it represents either reprehensible sloppiness in stating important, easily ascertainable facts in crucial, showcase make-your-first-impression pleadings in a case in which millions of dollars and the futures of two major religions are on the table, or a sneaking in of a deliberate misstatement to try to mislead the Court into coming to a false conclusion of fact.
The corresponding wording in the resolution -- A186 -- that was actually passed is "the blessing of same-sex unions is not in conflict with the core doctrine... of the Anglican Church of Canada." (More about this ellipsis later).
Consistent with. Not in conflict with. What's the diff?
Well go to dictionary.com and you'll see a number of definitions for "consistent" but the main ones all start with some form of the concept of "agreement". "Having agreement with", "Being agreeable to". Suppose you ask your buddy, "So how's your wife with that idea of yours of going out for dinner and drinks once a month with your old girlfriend, just as 'old friends?" Do you draw different conclusions about what's going on if he says "No prob. She agrees with it" than if he pauses and says "We're not in conflict about it"?
You see +Ingham wants to create the impression that the ACoC has said it's all hunky-dory with SSBs, that they're agreeable to the Church's system of doctrine in all its fullness. But it hasn't debased itself that far yet. One of the things it has said is that SSBs aren't in conflict with "core doctrine" because they have nothing to do with 'core doctrine', which concerns an entirely separate set of matters. The GS 2007 resolutions start by accepting some of the main premises of the 2005 St. Michael's Report, by the Primate's Theological Commission, one of which is that "core doctrine" is a relatively small area of doctrine containing the crucial good news of the nature of God and the salvivic good news in Jesus Christ. Same-sex blessings aren't in conflict with core doctrine; neither would be officially authorizing rites blessing pornography festivals or all-weekend bar crawls. That doesn't mean either rite would be consistent with Anglican doctrine in its entirety -- or legal on the Anglican church. Such rites would be illegal just as +Ingham's SSBs are illegal, their authorization being beyond his authority.
This misquotation is the smaller part in consequence of the two falsehoods in New Westminster's statement, but it bothers me more because it's either a cheap and sneaky act of attempted deception or an example of gross lawyerly laziness and sloppiness. And if it's the latter, ANiC if it loses will end up paying two-thirds of the cost of the time billed for this little piece of incompetence.
The other lie in the quotation of the GS resolution is one of omission. The actual resolution referred to "core doctrine in the sense of being credal". (BTW no one seems quite sure whether it should be "credal" or "creedal".) That is, core doctrine defined even more narrowly than I have described above, as the affirmations of the great creeds of the early church. As the St. Michael's Report said, "The determination of this question will not hinder or impair our common affirmation of the historic creeds." Which is all quite true, bit hardly any kind of addition to our ecclesiastical knowledge. No, Athanasius and the others didn't find it necessary to put anything in their creeds about homosexuals not being able to marry. Which has nothing to do with whether SSBs are allowable under Anglican doctrine as a whole. The St. Michael's Report said no, obviously not. They're inconsistent with the Church's teaching about sexuality. General Synod 2007 defeated a motion to permit dioceses to perform SSBs. For some reason New Westminster's introduction to the case doesn't tell you these things.
And it's kind of funny that +Michael Ingham (treating the filings of his counsel as his own statements) doesn't seem to know the wording of this resolution. It's not like he wasn't there at the time it was debated. The last two amendments fooling around with the wording of the motion before the final vote -- +Michael Ingham moved one and seconded the other.
Don't get me wrong. The question of whether +Ingham acted legally, illegally, irregularly, prematurely, deconstructionally or postmodernly ain't gonna make a difference in this case. The truth is that the Anglican Church of Canada is so chaotically organized, conceptually incoherent, and inhabited by a spirit of lawlessness that there is nobody who can give an authoritative ruling whether diocesan authorized SSBs are legal or not -- and no means of stopping or disciplining any bishop who simply defied such a ruling if it were given. The ACoC is an ecclesial jungle governed by the law thereof.
But remember when +Cowan of British Columbia sneakily used the quiet of an agreed truce and mediation period to have the locks changed and an alarm system installed and had to be ordered by a judge the next day to hand over the keys and codes and stop tampering with other people's property? Sometimes it's the little things, not the gross and sensational abuses and power grabs, that tell you what kind of people you're dealing with.
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