Judge says Russian Orthodox diocese has rights to New Jersey parish property

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The Associated Press Published: September 7, 2007

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NEWARK, New Jersey: A New Jersey judge said Friday that a Russian Orthodox diocese locked in a dispute with a breakaway parish has the right to the church's property, but said he could not intervene in doctrinal matters.


As a result, the ultimate fate of a small group of breakaway worshippers at the Sviato-Pokrovskiy Russian Orthodox Church remains undecided.


The heart of the conflict lies in the decision of the diocese, part of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, to reconcile with the Moscow Patriarchate in Russia. The parish's worshippers abhor the Moscow Patriarchate for its cooperation with the Soviets years ago and for its close ties with the Russian government today.


Superior Court Judge William C. Todd, in an order filed Thursday, barred the parish from selling its church and land without the permission of the diocese. The church, topped with golden onion-shaped domes, is on about 5 acres (2 hectares) in Buena Vista, about halfway between Atlantic City and Philadelphia.


That pleased the diocese, but parish lawyer Thomas M. Licata said Friday they would consider an appeal of that ruling.



Licata said the parish was pleased with those rulings, and that members "have every right to be present on the property and to worship at the church."


Nicholas Ohotin, a spokesman for the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, said the bishop would decide what to do with the parish and the property.


The Sviato-Pokrovskiy church was established in 1957 as part of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, a network of churches created after the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution by people who fled the Soviet Union and hated Communism.
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Associated Press writer Rebecca Santana in Trenton contributed to this story.



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