Decision allowing members to quit church and take building with them opens door for conservative exodus in Canada

A recent Bermuda court decision could open the doors for hundreds of conservative United Church congregations in Canada to quit the denomination and take their buildings with them.

Judge Norma Wade-Miller ruled on June 10 that a Bermuda congregation of the United Church could retain ownership of its property because the denomination fundamentally altered its theology when it began ordaining homosexuals.

Ian Outerbridge, the Toronto lawyer who won the case, says that although the Bermuda decision is not binding on Canadian courts, it does have application in Canada. He believes United Church congregations here could now make similar arguments and wrest title to their buildings from the denomination. However, the case would be expensive because it would inevitably be appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada.

"It would take us forever and a year, and cost many hundreds of thousands of dollars, but it could happen now," said Mr. Outerbridge.

Rev. Graham Scott, a conservative United Church of Canada theologian, agrees. He says the decision not only embarrasses the denomination, but also will stir up more discontent among Canadian congregations that are dissatisfied with the denomination’s steady drift toward a more liberal theology.

"If congregations could take their property with then, it wouldn’t surprise me if hundreds of congregations opted out," said Mr. Scott, editor of the Theological Digest and Outlook, and president of Church Alive, a small theological reform group within the denomination.

At least 60 United Church congregations, who disagreed with the ordination of homosexuals, did quit the denomination in the early 1990s, and eventually joined the Reformed Church of Canada and the Congregational Churches of Canada. All of them were forced to leave church buildings that had been built with the aid of their contributions.

One of those Reformed Church congregations, in Dover Centre, in southwestern Ontario, launched a legal battle to retain ownership of its building, but the courts ruled that it did belong to the United Church of Canada.

Margaret Ogilvie, an authority on church law, and a professor at Carleton University, has argued the Dover Centre decision was flawed and could be overturned, and her legal analysis of church property rights was cited by the judge in the Bermuda trial.

Cynthia Gunn, legal counsel for the United Church of Canada, disagrees with the legal opinions of both Ms. Ogilvie and Mr. Outerbridge.

She says the Bermuda decision has no relevance for Canadian churches and courts, because the Bermuda situation is unique. She said Canadian legislation gives title to all church property to the denomination, whereas in Bermuda, there is no such overall title to all church property.

Grace Methodist, the congregation that has left the United Church and has now won title to its building, argued that its property was originally donated on condition that it be used for worship services conducted according to the theology of John Wesley, the 18^th-century founder of the Methodist Church, one of the three denominations that merged in 1925 to form the United Church of Canada.

Bermuda’s Judge Wade-Miller ultimately agreed with the testimony of Victor Shepherd, of the Ontario Theological Seminary, who said Mr. Wesley would never have sanctioned the ordination of homosexuals.

The differences between Mr. Wesley’s theology and the current theology of the United Church of Canada "are so fundamental and deep-seated as to be irreconcilable," Judge Wade-Miller wrote.

She ruled the church building should therefore go to the majority of the congregation, which has remained faithful to the Methodist traditions.

The United Church of Canada has eight affiliated congregations in Bermuda, which are still legally part of the Wesleyan Methodist Church of Bermuda. When the United Church decision in 1992 to allow the ordination of homosexuals, four largely black congregations, including Grace Methodist, objected to the changes. Although a majority of Bermuda Methodists later voted to remain with the United Church of Canada, more than 80 per cent of Grace Methodist’s members objected, and gave notice they would leave the Methodist synod and take their building with them. The three other black congregations have also since given notice they intend to quit the Methodist Synod and the United Church of Canada.

By July 1996, the dispute between the majority of the Grace congregation and the Methodist synod had escalated to the point of an angry farce. Competing factions both gathered in the church for worship services, and tried to drown each other out with a competing organist and pianist. Later the two factions each tried changing the locks on the church doors.

Since then, both factions have been holding services in the church at different times, while the dispute worked its way through the courts.

Rev. Victor MacLeod, secretary of the Bermuda synod, said the court’s decision will likely be appealed to a higher court, but that decision will not be made until later this summer. In the meantime, the Bermuda synod is seeking a court injunction to allow the minority group at Grace Methodist to continue worshipping in the building on Sundays.

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