After split with San Joaquin Episcopal Diocese, schismatic congregations await ruling on property

FRESNO, Calif. - Anglicans who left the Episcopal Church in California's San Joaquin Valley to reject homosexual clergy are waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Will they lose the churches where they worship as a result of their split with the national church and Episcopal Diocese of San Joaquin? The answer could come any day over the next two months.

The stakes are high after more than 40 churches from Lodi to Bakersfield and from the coast to the Nevada border left the Fresno, Calif.-based diocese. They joined the Anglicans because of differences with the national Episcopal body over same-sex blessings, the ordination of a gay bishop and the authority of Scripture.

The national Episcopal Church filed the lawsuit in April 2008 to take church property back from the breakaway Anglicans.

The local court case involving church property doesn't look good for the Anglicans after a Fresno judge's tentative ruling in early May favored the Episcopal Diocese of San Joaquin, which remains with 19 Episcopal congregations. The final ruling must be made within 90 days or by Aug. 3.

"I was obviously disappointed in the tentative ruling," says Bill Atwood of Bass Lake, Calif., an Anglican parishioner at Christ Church in Oakhurst, Calif. "I'm hopeful and prayerful the judge would give it some thought and be fair and correct - and that he would rule in favor of the Anglicans who have departed."

Fresno County Superior Court Judge Aldolfo Corona wrote in a preliminary summary judgment that Bishop Jerry Lamb of the Episcopal Diocese of San Joaquin and the Episcopal Church would be owners of the property and buildings.

Corona cited a recent church property case in which three congregations left the Diocese of Los Angeles over disagreement with the Episcopal Church's decision in 2003 to approve the election of an openly gay bishop.

The California Supreme Court ruled the property and buildings belonged to the Los Angeles diocese and general Episcopal Church - and not to dissident congregations.

Corona could let his preliminary ruling stand, make revisions to it, or write a new final one.

In the central San Joaquin Valley, parishioners at Anglican churches have been talking in recent weeks about the Fresno judge's opinion. If it remains the same, attorneys representing Bishop John-David Schofield of the breakaway Anglican diocese say, they will appeal.

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