Judge rules church property subject to bankruptcy settlement

OregonLive.com ^ | 12/30/2005 | WILLIAM McCALL

[brainstem223]

"Stockholders are to Companies as Parishioners are to Churches. And at least the stockholders aren't morally supporting the crimes of the company."

Not true! Parishioners are have no ownership as do stockholders. They are like paying customers such as theater goers who pay admission even though the admission is voluntary. They have no liability in the monetary judgments. However the Cardinals, Bishops and guilty priests do. The supervisors who knowingly shuffled the perps around and covered up should be moldering in jail cells.

[Brytani]

" are you saying that in the identical situation, where one entity is a daycare and one is a church, the rules should be different?"

I'm not the only one saying this. As you may recall our founding fathers also made clear that an established religion is not a function or under the jurisdiction of the government. Our laws for years have upheld that exact fact, ie IRS laws concerning churches.

You continue to use a daycare as an example yet are forgetting the established difference between a for profit governmentally regulated business and a church.

[Bubbatuck]

OK...

So in your view, there is NO crime or activity whatsoever that a church could commit that would warrant sanction by the government without violating the first amendment?

Think twice before you answer.

Then change "church" to "mosque" and see if your answer is the same.

[Bubbatuck]

Homo priests, corrupt judges and slick lawyers are stealing 150 years of accumulated property from Catholic citizens. Our houses of worship will end up as strip clubs, mark my words. This is what is intended, all around.

First, the catholic citizens don't own the property, the corporation known as The Catholic Church does. And it's not being stolen - some assets are being taken to settle legal judgments: all done with due process. When the priests stop buggering boys, this won't be an issue. As long as the church refuses to deal with the problem and actively PROTECTS the bastards, it should expect to lose a lot more.

[T.L.Sink]

No and I speak from first-hand knowledge and can convey some interesting anecdotes regarding this. The Episcopal polity is similar to the Roman Catholic: each individual parish is incorporated into a diocese which is the basic ecclesiastical entity. Only denominations such as Congregationalists, Baptist, etc., are so structured that individual churches (parishes) have a high degree of autonomy. Parishes and missions (with very few exceptions) in ECUSA are an integral part-and-parcel part of a diocese and are legally so incorporated.

[Jack Black]

Long before there WAS a USA there were Catholic Churches in the USA. Long before the concept of a corporation was added to our laws there were individual Catholic churches here, in North America.

[Bubbatuck]

I don't understand the point. What does it matter when churches were founded?

They broke the law, a court has legally found the diocese responsible for making restitution, and has the power to enforce that decision.

[petconservative]

Down, Down she goes, the great harlot, who once sat over many waters. Woe to her......