FORT WORTH: Bishop optimistic about progress of property litigation
Episcopal News Service. September 10, 2010 [091010-04]
Pat McCaughan
Bishop C. Wallis Ohl said Sept. 9 that he is optimistic about the progress of litigation over disputed property and assets in the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth, after several recent court actions.
But he added that the ongoing litigation between the diocese and a breakaway group "is not the center of our diocesan life."
Ohl referred to a Texas judge's Sept. 2 decision to grant the Episcopal diocese's motion to "abate" or to halt a lawsuit involving a disputed bequest to a parish in 355th District Court in Hood County.
The case will be heard instead by 141st District Court Judge John P. Chupp in neighboring Tarrant County where a lawsuit to resolve issues about diocesan authority and church property is pending, according to a Sept. 8 statement released by the diocese.
The Episcopal diocese and the Episcopal Church had sued former bishop Jack Iker and former members of the corporation of the diocese's board in 141st District Court in Tarrant County in April 2009, to recover property and assets held by the former diocesan leaders.
The lawsuit also intended to establish that the continuing diocese was entitled to the use and benefit of property acquired by and for the mission of the Episcopal Church, established in 1838 in the Fort Worth area.
Iker and the former diocesan leaders, citing theological differences, disaffiliated from the Episcopal Church in November 2008 but attempted to retain property and assets. The group realigned itself with the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone but still has physical possession of at least 47 church buildings.
One of those disputed properties, St. Andrew's Church, Fort Worth, the oldest Episcopal church in the diocese, received a bequest from the Cynthia Brants Charitable Remainder Unitrust created in 2002, according to the statement released by the diocese. The trustee had asked the Hood County court to determine the legitimate diocesan authority.
Members of St. Andrew's, which was formed in 1875, continue to worship temporarily at Trinity Church in Fort Worth.
But a statement on the Anglican diocese's website called the Sept. 2 ruling by Hood County Judge Ralph H. Walton Jr. a "postponement" of the lawsuit "until the Tarrant County litigation ... is resolved." A Sept. 14 conference call with Tarrant County Judge John P. Chupp will determine "how that case should be styled," according to the website.
Additionally, the Sept. 9 statement from the continuing diocese noted that the diocese and Episcopal Church had filed amended pleadings Aug. 13 and Aug. 27, 2010 in part to comply with a June 25, 2010 appellate court ruling.
Those pleadings essentially reasserted the initial April 2009 lawsuit brought by the continuing diocese and the Episcopal Church. It had sought declarations that the Rt. Rev. Edwin "Ted" Gulick, then provisional bishop, as well as elected officials of the continuing diocese and their successors, were the sole diocesan authorities, not Iker and former officers. It also sought an injunction to prevent Iker and former officers from using the diocesan name, seal and other properties, as well as an accounting of and a return of assets and church properties.
A full copy of the filings may be found here.
The recent action also asked the court to declare that the continuing diocese has proper title to property.
Ohl said that the litigation, while "important to us ... is not the center of our diocesan life.
"I have been pleased to find an intense sense of mission throughout our diocese. I want to concentrate on that and let the courts handle the litigation. All that will take time. In the meantime, the people and clergy of the diocese are keeping our focus on doing the work of the church in this part of North Texas.
"That's what Episcopalians have been doing around here since 1838, and we intend to continue their work."