Here are two recent cases involved disputes among church members. The cases are interesting in a prurient sort of way; the theological and practical issues (for believers) are more substantive.
Firing Your Pastor: Who Decides?
The first dispute arose when the pastor of a small church in New York state reduced the number of worship services from two to one on Sundays. The thirty members held a meeting and a vote and the pastor was fired. Some members disputed that the vote was “illegal” and filed a lawsuit. The court was asked to determine which members properly composed the Board and therefore had the right to vote for firing. The petitioners also requested, (1) the vote be voided, (2) a restraining order placed against the church officers conducting church business, (3) those same officers resign; (4) the church books be turned over to the plaintiffs, and (4) the building locks not being changed.
While the Court noted that decisions about the fitness of any member of a church for duty was outside the jurisdiction of the court, this dispute was actually a matter of contract because church voting rights were determined by the church’s written by-laws. The bylaws (written by the church members long ago), provided that only the pastor could determine who were members. Therefore, the vote was illegal under contract law.
Read the court’s order here.
Who’s a Member and Who is Not?
The second is a appellate decision about a similar case in a church in Louisiana, though more complex. The church was founded in the 1940s as part of the Pentecostal Assemblies, but left the Assemblies and incorporated as a non-profit in 2009. In 2010, the pastor asked for the church’s approval to name his successor. The new Reverend assumed the duties and the church split into factions with allegations of threats and intimidation. The facts become complicated, but briefly, in 2013, the first pastor and some other long-time members sold the church property to heirs of the original founders of the church, who had provided the land. The deed had a reversionary clause in that, if the church ever ceased to exist, it would revert to back to the family or its heirs. The owners erected a fence, removed church records, and boxed up the new reverend’s personal belongings. The incorporated church filed a suit to maintain possession of the property and asked for injunctions and damages. The heirs filed for an exception based on the deed, and also arguing that the second pastor was not properly elected according to church bylaws.
The lower court ruled that this was a church matter and they could not intervene. They ordered the return of records and the building opened for services. Both sides promptly showed up at a service, held a meeting, and voted the new pastor out and the old pastor in. The second pastor filed a lawsuit that the meeting was improper. There was much more from both sides: accusations of bullying, misuse of church funds, and nepotism. Before the case was resolved, the first pastor died and the second re-filed the same claim, improperly changing the headings of the complaint and adding defendants.
The trial court ordered that the property to remain in the incorporated (new pastor) church’s custody until the heirs could file for a title action on the reversionary clause; the second pastor to remain in that role until a proper vote be held with valid members, and that each party submit a list of members for their counsel to determine who were members and who were not. The parties could not agree, so the court determined which members were true members, based on the lists (thereby determining the people who could vote for pastor). Apparently, the new pastor’s faction thought they would lose this vote, so they appealed the decision to the Louisiana Appellate Court.
The Court determined that none of the members of the original roll had ever been removed from the lists, and that a list of members compiled by the second pastor when he began his duties was also valid. These two lists would comprise the voting-eligible members.
You can read the Appellate Court’s decision here.
Commentary
The court’s decision in the first case is sound (in my opinion). If churches make contracts, they must follow the laws of the land in carrying out those contracts. This is sound law and sound Christian practice.[1. See Romans 13.1–7] I appreciate that court’s statement that who “is and is not a member” is a church issue, not a legal issue. The court did rule who could determine membership, based on the church’s own bylaws—which a matter of contract law. In the second case, the court did determined who were members directly, but they used lists provided by the churches to decide which group was the correct group. Maybe the court overstepped its jurisdiction here, but I don’t think so. I might, however, suggest that the churches went outside their “jurisdiction.”
People of faith who live in a land ruled by laws will sometimes need to interact with those laws and the courts. Transactions will be necessary (real estate deals, contacts for services, complain with employment law, etc.). But what of non-transactional law involving church disputes? Conflict is nothing new: we know of one instance of church members suing each other in the Roman courts.[2. First Corinthians 5-6. We do not know what the dispute was about, for Paul does not say. It may have has something to do with the man who was sleeping with his step-mother mentioned in 5.1, or fraud in 6.7, if the context is any clue.] Paul is astonished. He writes a letter to the congregation telling them that they should not sue one another. He has four reasons:
- Christians will help judge the world and the angels—are they unable to judge among their own earthly disputes? (It seems so.)
- When members have an ordinary argument, do they appoint an arbiter who is not a believer determine who is right? (Of course not.)
- Do they not know any Christian wise enough who could intervene, rather than asking a secular system to decide? (Surely there is someone…)
- Christianity is about forgiveness, grace, and reconciliation. If a church cannot practice those virtues among themselves, how can they expect non-believers to accept that God is about those things? (They can’t.)
Significantly, Paul tells the church that it would be better to be wronged than to take a controversy to the secular courts. Is Paul suggesting we should allow someone to hurt us rather than seek justice? He is pretty adamant: “In fact, to have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. Why not rather be wronged?”[3. 1 Cor 6.7.] This is a difficult request, and does not comport with much of modern American political or jurisprudential attitudes.
But his words are consistent with the Christian message: Jesus was wronged for our sins; God continually forgives sins; He offers mercy and grace and not judgement.
Did any of the church leaders in NY or Lousiana read this passage? If so, no one listened. But it seems that no one in Corinth listened to Paul either, for things got much worse in that church before they got better.
The interaction between what Christians believe and their cultural and legal environment is often difficult in practice. It’s a good thing God offers mercy and forgiveness for all.
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