A Show-down Coming?

Dr Ed Peters latest:

Lurching toward a Show-Down

Federal bankruptcy judge Elizabeth Perris has ruled that parish property within the Archdiocese of Portland OR is subject to seizure if needed to satisfy the liability obligations (chiefly, ones arising from clergy sexual misconduct cases) of the archdiocese. Judge Perris thus joins Judge Patricia Williams (hearing similar cases in Spokane WA) in holding, among other things, and for the time being at least, that bankruptcy law takes precedence over canon law and consequently trumps the Free Exercise clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution. How so?

Under civil law, parish properties across the United States are registered in at least four very different ways (corporation sole, religious corporation, various trust models, and fee simple). But to complicate unavoidably an already complex situation, under canon law all parishes are "juridic persons" (1983 CIC 515). Thus, regardless of civil registration forms, Catholic parishes canonically own the assets assigned to or acquired by themselves (1983 CIC 1256). Pastors, who administer parish assets (1983 CIC 532, 1279), and bishops, who exercise vigilance over property belonging to juridic persons in their territory (1983 CIC 392, 1276), are sworn (1983 CIC 833) to act in accord with canon law in the performance of their duties lest, among other things, their actions be null and they themselves be derelict performance of their duties (cit. omm.). The stage is now set for a classic "free-exercise" conflict. It arises thus:

Continued here...