8/07/2009

Christians suing Christians: It's all the rage.

Writing for the Church of England Newspaper, George Conger has pointed us to the fact that the Church of North India, The Anglican Church of India and the Church of India are all embroiled in lawsuits that now will go as a lump to the High Court of Delhi. The article, "Court to rule on Indian religious Row." has the details, including this: "Disputes over the control of church properties have reached fever pitch at times. On July 13 the Times of India reported that partisans of the ACI sought to evict the headmaster and administration of the CNI’s Christ Church College in Cawnpore (Kanpur). Police intervened in the dispute when the ACI appointed headmaster broke the locks on the headmaster’s office, and evicted his rival, claiming the historic Church of England school lawfully belonged to the ACI, not the CNI."

Ah, worldwide Anglicanism at its best. Churches in the Global South, some part of the Anglican Communion others not are chewing over the bones of colonial carcasses. The winners get to hold the property, and strangely enough, get to be the declared winner of the big prize - being officially recognized by the State of India as the "rightful successor to the Church of England in India.

How come this bit of suing never gets mentioned when the hand wringers are demanding a new moratorium on lawsuits?

5 comments:

  1. A little while back, didn't the Province of Central Africa under Malango sue to recover church property after the former bishop of Harare had been deposed?

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  2. Did any of that unpleasantness between the Anglican Church in Brazil and its renegade bishop in Recife go to court?

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  3. I have never understood why Christians get so uptight about going to court. Isn't it right a proper for people who disagree to take such issues before a judge for a decision? The prohibitions in scripture were to avoid taking a person to court in a dishonest or prejudicial court when the courts were swayed by graft or corruption.

    It is a whole lots better to take someone to court than to take what doesn't belong, or let some group take what does not belong to them.

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  4. Yes Kevin and I believe that suit in the Othodox Global South is ongoing. But we musn't talk about such things, after all they are the gaurdians of the Faith Once Delivered...

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  5. This is just great - colonize a country, create a mess of its land records, play a part in ordaining a renegade bishop and blame the natives for lawsuits on colonial carcasses and claim that only the west can ever be guardians of the faith once delivered. After all, the "spirit" does creative things only in the west - not good to have uppity natives around :)

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