Houston Windwood Presbyterian and PCUSA Settle in Mediation 4/8/2015

Started by red_dirt, April 16, 2015, 05:04:03 PM

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red_dirt

On  April 8th, 2015,  an arbitration settlement was reached in a seven year old case destined to have ramifications for  all Texas Presbyterian churches seeking disaffiliation from the Presbyterian Church United, PCUSA. 

Houston's  Windwood Presbyterian Church had filed a motion challenging the terms of  a trust created in 1982 by the PCUSA that  assigned itself  ownership of all assets owned by some 3,500 individual member Presbyterian churches and congregations.

Windwood argued that the trust was improperly formed.  Under Texas law,  the beneficiary of a trust cannot create that trust, and that Windwood had never agreed to form one. 

Legal experts were not surprised at the outcome. Most observers tend to agree, the main issues were not legal as much as they were in finding a congregation with the resources and tenacity to outlast the PCUSA, legally.  Just as Windwood was in the process of a second appeal, the Texas Supreme Court clarified, in Masterson, 2013,  that "church property disputes in Texas were to be judged solely according to neutral principles of law"  and defined specific procedures for settling such disputes. This ruling caused the lower appeal court to reverse it's decision.  Following that ruling, a panel recomended mediation. An agreement was then reached between the PCUSA and Windwood which both granted the Request for Dismissal and permitted the congregation to keep its church without paying the PCUSA. Prior to that, the PCUSA had demanded Windwood drop the lawsuit before it would grant the Request for Dismissal.

In a 2014 event, Highland Park Presbyterian in Dallas, Texas, gave in to the  PCUSA demands and paid it $7.5 million for its building and grounds, property with an assessed value of over $20 million.

Numerous Petitions for Dismissal from the PCUSA have come about after dozens of Presbyterian congregations, including Windwood, have expressed reluctance to go along with General Assembly resolutions that have effectively redefined doctrine and policy that some argue have been part and parcel of Judeao-Christian tradition since the days Abraham and Moses.  These doctrinal disputes have been seething in leadership circles since the 1970's. Windwood's congregation was 99% in agreement to disaffiliate and join the newly formed Evangelical Covenant Presbyterian.  The PCUSA is the fastest shrinking denomination of the main line American churches.

Resource:
http://www.layman.org/with-no-exchange-of-money-texas-church-gets-clear-title-to-its-property/



kroz

Thanks for that post, Red_dirt.   I am very glad to hear that Windwood won that one!!  It is a good church that is growing rapidly and deserved to keep their assets.

Too bad Highland Park paid so much!  But they are a very wealthy church.  So it probably didn't hurt them.

red_dirt

Thank you, Kroz.  As a Texan, these particulars are of interest to you. Before other forum members are tempted to ask,  "What difference does it make?" I'll point out the link to the Democrats "total transformation," which is, more like a total left wing takeover of America, its government, cities,  and institutions.  It is no longer enough to say, "Oh, I don't go to church," or, "Oh, I don't live in a city." This is America we are talking about.

Briefly, in the 1960's, liberals in the ten Presbyterian seminaries, Chicago McCormack in particular, got busy promoting discussion Jesuit-style social issues as if the Jesuit-style social issues were at the core of the Christian religion, which, they are not. McCormack is closely linked to The University of Chicago and Loyola. Funny how otherwise liberal atheist intellectuals  should suddenly take such an interest in feminist and gay issues, cultural relativism, Palestine positions, and all the rest, in the church, isn't it?  All the while, the seminaries are packing the Presbyterian clergy  with leftists.  All the left could do was complain about the church, and here they are, all worked up about church issues!  Alls I can say is, funny thing about that.

This becomes relevant in the context of what has been referred to as the complete uncorking of leftist political power triggered by the election of Barack Obama in 2008. The fifty years preceding or leading up to 2008 were the years of preparation.

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PS: Winwood Pastor Kevin Rudolph points out Winwood's case hinged on the validity of the trust clause, which Winwood had not connected to.  He says Highland Park has other issues that cause it to fall into another category. The road for Highland Park was not so open, so it settled. HP may not so easily get its money back, even if it were to try.
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red_dirt

Looking at the question, "How did liberals take over the Presbyterian Church," one who has written extensively is a controversial figure named Gary North. Dr. North is associated Christian home schooling, Rep. Ron Paul, and other conservative topics such as the Austrian school of economics.
In "Crossed Fingers," he writes about the Modernists', or liberals', takeover of the main line Protestant church, Presbyterian in this case, which he says began in the 1870's and culminated in 1936, with the expulsion of conservatives. One of his statements is quite telling.

Factions and Functionaries
The liberals were liberals; they sought power in terms of modernism's five-point creed. They were Progressives. They were also promoters of a religion deeply opposed to Christianity. Their goal was simple: to capture an institution that belonged to their enemies. It is not difficult to understand their motives. They were men who coveted the ecclesiastical robes of authority, but who did not have the capital to construct their own ecclesiastical empire.
Their goal was to steal the institutional Church without suffering a revolt by the donors.  They wanted the robes of ecclesiastical authority, just as they wanted the robes of academic authority (tenured professorships) and the robes of judicial authority. They wanted access to other people's money--people who did not believe what they believed. This has been the goal of twentieth-century liberalism, political and theological: build a new world order with old world money. The implementation of this plan was pioneered by Presbyterian Woodrow Wilson, who did it first with Presbyterianism's Princeton University, then with the U.S. government, and suffered a stroke while he was campaigning to do it with the world.

kroz

Excellent information red_dirt..

You have connected some of the dots that I did not know existed.

I have always believed Woodrow Wilson was the worst President in U.S. history.  He set us on this course exactly one hundred years ago.  He would be proud to see what we have become today!

He was the first "progressive" President.  But the term "progressive" fell out of favor with Americans and was changed to "liberal".

Because of the time lapse (100 years) the term "progressive" has been reintroduced because "liberal" has lost it's luster.  And today's population think it is a totally new term!!

Wilson was just as evil as Obama but much, much more shrewd and smart.  He outmaneuvered virtually everyone in Washington.   They did not know what hit them until he was long gone.

I am not surprised that he is at the root of the demise of Presbyterianism. 

He is at the root of the demise of much that affects us today.