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The high court of the Presbyterian Church (USA) announced decisions in favor of a lesbian woman and a gay man on Tuesday, Nov. 3. Meeting in Indianapolis, Friday, Oct. 30, the court heard arguments related to Lisa Larges, a lesbian woman who has been a candidate for ordination for more than two decades and Paul Capetz, a gay man whose January 2008 reinstatement by his home Presbytery was challenged. The Larges and Capetz cases are the first cases to use a 2008 compromise voted by the denomination so that, despite a ban on partnered gay and lesbian ministers, Presbyteries could...

Mainline Protestant churches seem to have weathered the past decade better than many people have assumed, but the future is raising serious challenges to continued stability, said a Christian pollster. George Barna analyzed data for The Barna Group's latest report examining mainline denominations. Weekend attendance at mainline churches has remained relatively stable, ranging from 89 to 100, over the past decade but the report suggests that they may be "on the precipice of a period of decline." Mainline bodies – which the research group identifies as American Baptist Churches in the USA; The Episcopal Church; the Evangelical Lutheran Church in...

SAN ANSELMO, CA — Elizabeth Liebert will become the first Roman Catholic sister named as dean of a Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) seminary this summer when she takes over the position at San Francisco Theological Seminary (SFTS). With more than two decades of teaching experience at the 138-year-old seminary, Liebert will replace the Rev. Jana Childers, who will step down June 30 after nearly eight years as dean. “We are particularly pleased to be attaining a historic ecumenical milestone,” SFTS President Phil Butin said. “Dr. Liebert's deanship is a sterling example of SFTS's thoroughgoing commitment to ecumenical theological education.” “This seems...

"What if church wasn't just a building, but thousands of doors?" asks a new website launched by the United Methodist Church. "Each of them opening up to a different concept or experience of church. . . . Would you come?" After watching its membership drop nearly 25 percent in recent decades, the United Methodist Church, which is still the nation's largest mainline Protestant denomination, thinks it knows the answer. So it's pouring $20 million into a new marketing campaign, including the website, television advertisements, even street teams in some cities, to rebrand the church from stale destination to "24-7 experience."...

OUR MISSION: Following the risen Christ, and seeking to make the Church a true community of hospitality, the mission of More Light Presbyterians is to work for the full participation of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people of faith in the life, ministry and witness of the Presbyterian Church (USA). "God's Whole Family" Conference Registration now open The National Welcoming & Affirming Presbyterian Conference September 4 - 6, 2009: Labor Day Weekend Second Presbyterian Church, Nashville, Tennessee "God's Whole Family" is hosted by Second Presbyterian Church, Nashville and produced by More Light Presbyterians for pro-LGBT Presbyterians, families, friends and allies....

DAVENPORT — Members of the East Iowa Presbytery voted last night in favor of changing the constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) to allow the possibility of gay and lesbian ministers. Pastors and ruling elders of the East Iowa Presbytery voted 74-21 in support of an amendment that would change wording in the church constitution that currently requires ministers to adhere to sexual chastity unless they are married. Marriage is legal for same-sex couples in only a handful of states. The amendment would not guarantee that gays and lesbians could become ministers but it would open the possibility, said the...

Unofficially, ordination requirement is affirmed The Layman, Posted Wednesday, April 22, 2009 The “fidelity/chastity” requirement will remain in The Book of Order, according to the unofficial reports of votes by presbyteries in the Presbyterian Church (USA). The April 22 reports raised the number of presbyteries supporting the Biblical ordination standards to 86, the number needed for a majority. Surprisingly, San Francisco, the last presbytery to report its vote on April 22, was the 86th to reject an amendment to G-6.0106b that would have eliminated the language requiring candidates for ordination to maintain fidelity in their marriages and chastity if single....

The Presbyterian Church (USA) and Evangelical Lutheran Church in America both have slashed their 2009 budgets, cutting programs and laying off scores of personnel as denominations continue to suffer from the recession. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in American (ELCA), the nation's largest Lutheran denomination, announced a $5.6-million reduction in its 2009 budget on Tuesday (March 31). The cut was necessary in part because regional synods plan to decrease their contributions to the denomination by $2.4 million this year, church leaders said. Since last November, the ELCA has eliminated more than 23 jobs and cut 12 additional vacant positions. All churchwide...

On a stormy Sunday morning in Charlotte, N.C., latecomers were still shaking off wet umbrellas and streaming into a rented chapel at a local Catholic high school as Anglican minister Filmore Strunk led the congregation in reading Psalm 19: "The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, more than much fine gold." For this congregation, those words ring especially true: Less than 15 months ago, the 300-member group was worshipping with more than 1,000 other parishioners in a 22,000-square-foot, gothic-style sanctuary on a prime piece of property in a growing...

Two Protestant groups are moving towards allowing the ordination of homosexuals in long-term monogamous relationships as ministers. The governing council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the largest Lutheran organization, voted this week to have a vote in the national assembly on the issue, The Christian Science Monitor reported. The Presbyterian Church (USA) approved homosexual ordination last year, but it will not take effect unless two-thirds of the presbyteries, the 173 district councils, vote in favor by June. Both groups already allow homosexuals to be ordained if they are celibate.

In a break from the past, North Texas clergy and lay leaders of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) have voted to ease the way for ordination of openly gay pastors, deacons and elders. Clergy and lay leaders of Grace Presbytery – the regional body covering 177 churches in North Texas and other parts of the state – voted Saturday to remove constitutional language requiring that ordained officers maintain "fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman or chastity in singleness." Kathy Collier, pastor of First Presbyterian of Forney, supported the change, saying it was past time for...

LOUISVILLE – No one could escape the somber atmosphere enshrouding last week’s General Assembly Council meeting, which culminated Friday in a $4 million budget cut and pink slips for 14 staffers. But among those involved in denominational politics, the week proved especially trying for left-leaning activists committed to social causes and minority issues. For them, a series of recent developments – from organizational restructuring to GAC bylaw changes – triggered calls to action and concerns that the Presbyterian Church (USA)’s “prophetic” wing wasn’t receiving a fair shake. “Folks on the left are scared,” observed GAC member Thomas Gillespie as the...

Members of a committee in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) will gather this week to consider proposed changes, including the removal of a negative reference to homosexual behavior, to a historic document. The General Assembly Special Committee on Correcting Translation Problems of the Heidelberg Catechism is scheduled to begin a two-day meeting on March 27. Last June, the General Assembly, which is the highest governing body of the denomination, approved a proposal to begin revising the Heidelberg Catechism – a document of the Reformed Christian faith that is part of the PC(USA)'s constitution. Presbyterians at the biennial meeting debated the current...

San Francisco, CA (AP) -- A lesbian Presbyterian deacon's application for ordination has been stopped, at least for now. A church commission Wednesday rejected the process used by the Presbytery of San Francisco to approve 45-year-old Lisa Larges' candidacy for ordination.

Not long ago Presbyterian congregations that promoted conserving resources were considered progressive. Now, in a time of soaring energy costs and a declining economy, such actions might be seen more as conservationist — as in conserving the environment and sometimes even protecting church budgets. From small congregations (of which there are many) to big-steeple churches, Presbyterians are becoming more interested in “going green.” It’s a term that some critics say is over-used, but whatever the motivation, more churches are doing it. “Presbyterians are getting involved, asking questions, asking for resources at a much higher rate,” says Rebecca Barnes-Davies, former coordinator...

This following report comes to us from Christian Post: Members of a committee in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) will gather this week to consider proposed changes, including the removal of a negative reference to homosexual behavior, to a historic document. The General Assembly Special Committee on Correcting Translation Problems of the Heidelberg Catechism is scheduled to begin a two-day meeting on March 27… Much of the controversy revolved around a reference to “homosexual perversion” among a list of sinful behaviors that is not found in the original German text. Opponents of the current translation argued that the original text and...

Leaders of Pittsburgh Presbytery believe religious liberty is endangered because civil courts are preventing presbyteries from exercising religious authority over congregations that want to take property out of the denomination. In response they have organized a convocation, "Our Freedom of Religion at Risk -- A Presbyterian Crisis," for Thursday, from 2 to 5:30 p.m., in Beulah Presbyterian Church, Churchhill. Attendance is free, but a live Webcast for long-distance viewing costs $10. Registration is at www.presbyterianconvocation.org. Over the past two years, dozens of the 10,000 congregations in the Presbyterian Church (USA), including three in Pittsburgh Presbytery, left for the more theologically...

The largest Presbyterian Church (USA) congregation in Arkansas on Sunday elected a homosexual as deacon... The vote comes one day after the Presbytery of Arkansas voted to remove restrictions on homosexual ordination from the national church's Book of Order... Upson is a bell choir member and oversees the acolyte program. A Second Presbyterian member since 2001, he also has taught Sunday School, volunteered for Vacation Bible School and served as a lay leader...

NEW YORK (AP) — Membership in the nation's two largest Christian church bodies, the Roman Catholic Church and Southern Baptist Convention, declined slightly in 2007, according to the latest edition of the Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches. The Catholic church remains the largest body of believers in the U.S., with 67 million members, the yearbook said. But from 2006 to 2007 the church shed 398,000 members in the U.S. — a 0.59 percent drop. Southern Baptists reported 16.2 million members for a decline of 0.24 percent, or a loss of nearly 40,000 members. Although the declines are relatively small,...

Two mainline denominations have announced decisions indicating a further move away from Bible-based Christianity. In Michigan, the new bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Northern Michigan is an ordained Zen Buddhist. Northern Michigan's Episcopal congregations and delegates overwhelmingly elected the Rev. Kevin Thew Forrester at their convention on Saturday. The diocesan website says Thew Forrester "has practiced Zen meditation for almost a decade," and the Buddhist community welcomed his commitment by granting him "lay ordination." The website also says Northern Michigan's new bishop "resonates deeply" with "his own interfaith dialogue with Buddhism and meditative practice." Meanwhile, Presbyterian Church (USA) representatives...

Another Presbyterian Church (USA) is set to close its doors this spring. West Presbyterian Church of Wilmington, Del., has announced that it will hold its last worship service in its historic Gothic church building on April 26. ... In the ‘90s, it became a More Light Presbyterians governing body member by ascribing to their mission statement: "Following the risen Christ, and seeking to make the Church a true community of hospitality, the mission of More Light Presbyterians is the full participation of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people of faith in the life, ministry, and witness of the Presbyterian Church...

Responding to a recent document released by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) that attempted to clarify the denomination's stance on debated issues, conservative Presbyterian leaders say the arguments are irrelevant. "We think there is an unfortunate but clear distinction between what is on paper and what is the working theology of the denomination," said the Rev. Dr. D. Dean Weaver, senior pastor of Memorial Park Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh and co-moderator of the New Wineskins Association of Churches – a network of dissident Presbyterians. PC(USA)'s stated clerk, the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, and General Assembly Council executive director, Linda Valentine, addressed a...

Gradye Parsons, the stated clerk of the Presbyterian Church (USA), has added a new twist to the messianic aura that seemed to surround the presidential campaign of Barack Obama. “Mr. President,” he said, “before you save us, let us have a chance to profess our ills.” -snip- John Thomas, the president of the United Church of Christ, expressed his appreciation that Obama had been “schooled by a preacher named Jeremiah” to serve as a “public theologian who shapes the way people understand their relationship to God,” RNS reported.

The Presbytery of Chicago has borrowed money to settle a multi-million-dollar civil suit by four men who say they were sexually molested by a presbytery youth minister when they were children. It is still trying to figure out how to repay the loan. The cost of the settlement has not been disclosed. But it is known that the presbytery is having to sell off some its property. The presbytery has already sold a portion of a retreat in Saugatuck, Mich., and there are plans to sell the presbytery’s headquarters in Chicago. The presbytery has its offices in a converted warehouse...

A Tulsa, Okla., megachurch lost a two-year property battle in court Tuesday when the county district judge ruled in favor of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Judge Jefferson Sellers ruled that the the Kirk of the Hills church property belongs to the PC(USA) and the Eastern Oklahoma Presbytery, a regional body of the denomination, and not the local congregation. The 2,400-member Kirk of the Hills congregation, which was the second largest church in the regional presbytery, has been in legal battle over the property since it split from the PC(USA) in August 2006. After an overwhelming vote to leave the denomination,...

In a move that echoes a division in the Episcopal church, at least three Valley Presbyterian churches are taking steps to move to another denomination over differences about the Bible and homosexuality. Officials at Valley congregations say they are at odds with Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the nation's largest Presbyterian denomination, over its decision to drop a church standard that potential ministers, deacons and elders live in "fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman, or chastity in singleness."

Tulsa, Okla., September 9, 2008 – Tulsa County District Judge Jefferson Sellers ruled today that the Presbyterian Church USA (PCUSA) and the Eastern Oklahoma Presbytery of the PCUSA (EOP) own the Kirk of the Hills property at 4102 E. 61st Street, under the denomination’s constitution... The Kirk of the Hills paid for the property over the last four decades and the deeds are in the Kirk Corporation’s name. ... The Kirk has been in a legal battle over this property since the Kirk withdrew from PCUSA denomination in August 2006. ...

A third lawsuit has been filed involving Peters Creek United Presbyterian Church, whose members voted 207-26 last year to leave the Presbyterian Church (USA) for the more theologically conservative Evangelical Presbyterian Church. On Monday the minority, who Washington Presbytery has declared the "true church," sued the majority, asking the Washington County Common Pleas Court to remove the officers of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church and return all property to control of the Presbyterian Church (USA). Last year the majority sued Washington Presbytery, the local governing body of the Presbyterian Church (USA), for the right to keep all property. Last month Washington...

Clovis native Rebecca Sitterly registered to vote soon after returning to her native state in 1979 and jumped right into Democratic politics about the same time. So the former Bernalillo County district judge was surprised to get a July 3 call from a community nonprofit that was checking on her new registration. When Sitterly said she hadn't filled out a registration form (indeed, she'd been regularly voting in the same place on Mountain Road NW in Albuquerque for nearly 20 years) a supervisor with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now promised to destroy the card, Sitterly said in...

This year, in addition to Woodland Presbyterian Church in New Orleans, more than a dozen PCUSA congregations have left with their property from the denomination, or are seeking dismissal.

Bruce Reyes-Chow "PCUSA" is a "mainline" denomination of 2.3 million members. This is the spirit of the times (zeitgeist): certainly not the Holy Spirit. According to a story from the Catholic News Agency: San Jose, CA., Jul 8, 2008 / 11:57 pm (CNA).- Reaction continues to the decisions of the 218th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church USA (PCUSA), which took place between June 21 and June 28. The assembly nullified proscriptions against sexual behavior outside of marriage and called for a vote to delete the church’s constitutional standard requiring fidelity in marriage and chastity in singleness. It also...

San Jose, CA., Jul 8, 2008 / 11:57 pm (CNA).- Reaction continues to the decisions of the 218th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church USA (PCUSA), which took place between June 21 and June 28. The assembly nullified proscriptions against sexual behavior outside of marriage and called for a vote to delete the church’s constitutional standard requiring fidelity in marriage and chastity in singleness. It also initiated a process that could remove mention of the Bible’s prohibition against homosexuality form the Heidelberg Catechism. The moves are seen by some as an attempt to clear a path for the eventual ordination...

The Episcopal Church has been at the forefront of baptizing active homosexual lifestyle as God-blessed. Since 1960, that denomination has decreased in membership by 48%. The United Methodist Church has been roiled by those adamant on establishing homosexual lifestyles as Christian legitimate. In the fight for one side or another that denomination has decreased in membership by 25%. The Presbyterian Church (USA) has likewise been embroiled in the tussle. That denomination has decreased in membership by 44%. The Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) has also been riddled with in-house fighting over homosexual lifestyles as anti-God or pro-God. That denomination's membership...

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- The nation's largest Presbyterian denomination on Friday (June 27) cracked open the door to ordaining non-celibate gay and lesbian clergy, though the decades-old fight is far from over. Delegates at the Presbyterian Church (USA) meeting here voted 54 percent to 46 percent to remove a clause in their constitution that requires clergy to be either married and faithful or single and chaste. But the action still needs approval by a majority of the denomination's 173 regional bodies, called presbyteries, and similar moves in recent years have twice failed to win ratification on the local level. In...

PALO ALTO, Calif. — As their biannual meeting concluded last week, Presbyterian Church leaders took some actions that irritated Jewish groups, but steered clear of the talk of divestment from Israel that ignited a firestorm in Presbyterian-Jewish relations in 2004. On Friday, the church's general assembly, in a 504-171 vote, approved a resolution endorsing a proposal for Middle East peace crafted in Jordan last year. Known as the Amman Call, the plan includes a "right of return" for Palestinian Arabs that Israel has rejected because it could produce a wave of immigration that would mean the demise of Israel as...

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)'s highest governing body voted Friday in favor of a proposal that would allow for the ordination of non-celibate gays and lesbians. The 218th General Assembly, meeting in San Jose, Calif., this week, voted 380-325 to send the overture – that would delete the requirement that clergy live in "fidelity within the covenant of marriage between and a man and a woman, or chastity in singleness" – to the denomination's 173 presbyteries for approval. Adding to the blow to conservatives, the Assembly also adopted a supplementary authoritative interpretation of the PC(USA) constitution that would allow gay and...

Two years ago, American Jewish community relations groups were busy patting themselves on the back for achieving a signal victory in turning back the attempt by anti-Israel radicals to hijack the Presbyterian Church USA. After the Presbyterians became the first Protestant church to embrace divestment from companies doing business in Israel in 2004, Jewish groups worked hard to overturn the decision. When the church voted to back away from this stand in 2006, it was rightly seen as a triumph not just for friends of Israel, but for the tactic of outreach itself as years of tenacious diplomacy paid off....

The Presbyterian Church (USA) lost 57,572 members in 2007, the worst decline in decades, according to the official statistics released by Stated Clerk Clifton Kirkpatrick on Saturday. That leaves the denomination with 2,209,546 members, 2 million fewer than the number of Presbyterians who were members of the predecessor denominations in 1965 that merged in 1983 to form the PCUSA. Kirkpatrick's office projects even higher losses in 2008 and 2009.

Many of American Jewry's largest religious and advocacy groups have lashed out in the past few days at the Presbyterian Church USA for a new document published by the church that warned against anti-Jewish bias in the church's pursuit of Israeli-Palestinian peace. The new document "does more to excuse anti-Semitism and foster anti-Jewish motifs then it does to dispel them," according to a strongly worded letter to church leader Rev. Cliff Kirkpatrick, the stated clerk of the Presbyterian Church, from Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Union for Reform Judaism; Rabbi Jerome Epstein, executive vice president of the United Synagogue...

The regional governing body of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and representatives of the Stow Presbyterian Church have reached an agreement that allows the local congregation to keep the church property. The pact comes after 18 months of discussions between the Stow church and the Eastminster Presbytery, according to the Rev. Dan Schomer, who leads the Mineral Ridge-based presbytery, which includes 55 churches in Summit, Portage, Columbiana, Mahoning and Trumbull counties. ''The action to dissolve the congregation effectively severs the ties of the church to the denomination and permits it to continue its ministry as an independent congregation,'' Schomer said in...

United Methodists declared Monday a "banner day" as they approved a full communion agreement with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The new relationship between the two major Protestant denominations is not a merger but a recognition of each other's ministry and mission. Full communion recognizes that each church has "the one, holy, catholic and apostolic faith" expressed in the Scriptures and confessed in historic creeds and the core teachings of each denomination. The two churches also recognize the authenticity of each other's baptism and eucharist and the full interchangeability of all ordained ministers. "It's not merger," said Bishop Melvin...

Tiburon, Calif. (AP) -- The highest court of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has found that a Northern California minister did not violate denominational law when she officiated at the weddings of two lesbian couples. The ruling announced Tuesday by the Louisville, Ky.-based court overturns a decision against the Rev. Jane Spahr last year. A regional judicial committee had found Spahr guilty of misconduct and gave her a rebuke — the lightest possible punishment. The church's high court found that the ceremonies Spahr performed were not marriages, so she did not violate the church's constitution. The panel reiterated the church's position...

A judge ruled April 8 in favor of the motion for a summary judgment filed six months earlier by First Presbyterian Church in Roseville, Calif., which had been seeking quiet title to its property, as well as declaratory and injunctive relief, since March 2007. She also ruled against a competing motion for a summary judgment filed by the presbytery. *** "If you saw from the decision of the court, under California law, trusts are presumptively revocable unless the trust instrument makes them expressly irrevocable," he said. "And in the plain language, as we argued to the court, the plain language...

Several U.S. mainline Protestant denominations are about to face their latest showdowns on one of the most vexing issues since slavery: whether to break from biblical morality as traditionally understood to allow clergy with homosexual partners and to sanction blessing ceremonies for same-sex couples. "Mainline" groups (predominantly white, with early American roots, and affiliated with the National Council of Churches) contain vocal, well-organized liberal and evangelical combatants. The resulting dispute "certainly has taken a big toll," says Jack Haberer of Presbyterian Outlook, an independent magazine that airs varied views. "For some, it's the total compromise of all things moral. For...

Divestment: Coming to a Denomination Near You   By Dr. Earl TilfordFrontPageMagazine.com | Thursday, April 03, 2008 For a generation after World War II, particularly given revelations of the Holocaust, most American Protestant denominations embraced a more tolerant attitude toward Jews. Since the 1980s, however, there has been a marked shift, evident in the anti-Israeli positions adopted by more liberal denominations like the United Methodist Church (UMC); the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA); the Episcopal Church in the United States of America (ECUSA); and the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. (PCUSA).At its April meeting in Fort Worth, the National Conference of...

-snip- Tissues will be needed Sunday when the north Oak Cliff church, known for community service, closes after 118 years. -snip- Trinity has struggled for years as an aging, predominantly Anglo church in a neighborhood turned largely Hispanic. Average Sunday attendance has dwindled from 100 to 40 in the last decade...Indeed, about a third of Trinity's faithful now live at Grace Presbyterian Village, a seniors community in east Oak Cliff. -snip- In the last few years, Trinity tried various strategies, including advertising that it is openly welcoming to gay people. But nothing reversed the decline.

The majority of a large southwest Florida church will officially leave the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) on Good Friday, following a decision by the regional presbytery to allow their departure. Covenant Presbyterian Church in Fort Myers, Fla., a congregation of 1,340 members, had voted last month to request dismissal from the PC(USA). The majority, 76 percent, voted in favor of leaving, citing that the denomination is headed in a liberal direction. And 24 percent voted against it. Peace River Presbytery declared the church divided and denied the congregation's request to leave. The presbytery, however, created an administrative commission to negotiate with...

FLOWER MOUND, Texas -- The cemetery next to the Flower Mound Presbyterian Church was a peaceful, well-kept place until Tuesday night. An overflow of voters trying to join the caucus next door ended up leaving muddy tire tracks through the cemetery. One vehicle's tire actually got stuck in a recently filled grave. Many voters parked on the shoulder of a gravel road winding through the cemetery, right next door to the church where the voting was taking place. One witness says motorists either didn't notice -- or didn't care -- they were parking just a few feet from buried bodies....

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The Presbyterian Church (USA) is anticipating annual membership losses will reach 46,544 in 2008, growing to 50,000 in 2009, and another 43,436 members expected to leave the denomination in 2010. Those projections of 139,980 members leaving the PCUSA in the next three years follow on actual membership losses of 91,649 over the past two years - 43,175 in 2006 and 48,474 in 2007, according to a report released Feb. 13 at a joint meeting of the General Assembly Council and the Committee on the Office of the General Assembly.

A legal complaint pitting a Mississippi congregation that left the Presbyterian Church (USA) against the Presbytery of Mississippi has been returned to state court by a federal judge. Grace Chapel Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Madison, Miss., is seeking a temporary restraining order to prevent Mississippi Presbytery from violating a final declaratory judgment that resolved a property ownership lawsuit that the church brought against the presbytery in March. Mississippi Presbytery moved the church's request to U.S. District Court within 30 days of its Aug. 29 filing, saying there was a federal question about the free exercise of religion under the First...