By Barbara Denman
Florida Baptist Witness
March 12, 2009
http://www.floridabaptistwitness.com/10010.article
ORLANDO (FBC)—A Jacksonville congregation embroiled in seven active lawsuits over the actions of a former pastor three decades before has been sued more than a dozen times in the current pastor's 16-year tenure. All but one of the church's five entities have been named in separate lawsuits—the only exception, the church's cemetery.
As the church dealt with the most recent rash of lawsuits, its pastor was consumed with legal matters for more than a year, unable to effectively perform church responsibilities other than preaching. More than half a million dollars have been spent in legal fees and $50,000 paid out for a media consultant to help the pastor communicate to the community about sensitive and potentially harmful matters.
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| LAWSUITS Clayton Cloer, pastor, First Baptist Church of Central Florida in Orlando, hosted a Church Liability Summit March 3. |
Although the Jacksonville church is in a unique situation, Orlando pastor Clayton Cloer believes it will only be time before other churches will be faced with some form of litigation.
"We are a generation of litigation where people are looking for any reason to go to court," Cloer said.
Working in partnership with the Florida Baptist Convention, Cloer, pastor of First Baptist Church of Central Florida in Orlando, held a Church Liability Summit, March 3 in Orlando, which brought together a dozen experts in areas of law, accounting and insurance to analyze cultural changes which are expected to affect the church.
The generation of litigation coupled with "a genuine contempt for churches" and "cataclysmic social changes" has brought "a new moral climate," said Cloer. He contends the church is under siege from a variety of sources—activist judges, a "liberal administration," encroaching taxes, skyrocketing premiums for liability insurance, sexual abuse scandals and an "outright attack on religious liberty."
Harry Mihet, senior litigation counsel with the Liberty Counsel, said although most people think Christians don't sue churches or other Christians, the number of lawsuits involving churches increases every year. These litigated liabilities range from parking lot accidents to food borne illness and from professional counseling to sexual abuse. "One-in-five churches file a liability claim every year."
John Sullivan, Florida Baptist Convention executive director-treasurer, concurred with Mihet, noting that several Florida Baptist churches are involved with internal lawsuits.
Churches are not prepared and lack sufficient insurance coverage in the event of a lawsuit, Mihet added. "Lawsuits divert the attention of churches from winning souls to winning litigation," he said.
He suggested actions a church can undertake to win or minimize the chance of lawsuits, including: conduct internal audits of risk management; have an informed congregation by adopting and circulating bylaws and constitution; screen youth workers, including FBI checks and fingerprinting; develop use policies for telephones and computers; revise outdated employments policies; and adopt church document management and retention programs.
Cloer's warnings were echoed by many of the participants in the half-day think tank.
Calling his presentation, "The Coming Storm," Nathan Adams, senior counsel with the Holland and Knight law firm in Tallahassee, which specializes in non-for-profit legal representation, identified six primary threats to the church—faith-based employment and affiliation, social services and speech, general liability and zoning.
One of the greatest challenges the church will face, he suggested, will be its right to hire only persons of like faith and practice. Additionally, churches could be prevented from monitoring the non-work activities of its employees. Legal decisions in gender and sexual orientation discrimination cases one day may force religious institutions to hire unmarried pregnant women and gays, he said. Religious institutions may also become subject to expanded non-discrimination requirements by signing public contracts, receiving public funds or participating in government funded programs.
Echoing Adams' conclusions, Kenyn Cureton with the Washington, D.C.-based Family Research Council sounded an alarm of potential legal liabilities that may be found against churches if two current pieces of federal legislation are enacted.
The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (EDNA) being considered by the U.S. Congress will prohibit employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, making it illegal for churches and related organizations with 15 or more employees to fire or refuse to hire or promote an employee because of sexual orientation, Cureton explained.
Although churches and church-sponsored schools "appear to be exempted for now," Cureton said, religious businesses, such as Christian bookstores or private religious schools may not be exempt.
Cureton added, "President Obama lists EDNA as one of his administration's legislative priorities according to the Civil Rights section on the White House website."
He also warned of the potential enforcement of hate crimes legislation introduced in Congress in 2007, which would elevate sexual orientation to a protected legal status. The wording of the proposed legislation would make it a crime to "cause bodily injury to any person because of the actual or perceived religion, gender, sexual orientation or disability of any person ..."
Referencing the Liberty Counsel's opinion, Cureton said hate crimes legislation could prove "disastrous for religious ministers and organizations who advocate peacefully against the homosexual lifestyle." Pastors who preach sermons opposing the homosexual lifestyle could be prosecuted for conspiracy should a person who hears the sermon apply it in a way prohibited by the hate crime legislation.
Such has happened in two nations with hate crime legislation laws, the attorney explained.
A Pentecostal pastor in Sweden, Ake Green, was sentenced to a month in prison under Sweden's hate speech law after he gave a sermon on the traditional Christian view of homosexuality. His conviction was eventually overturned by the Swedish Supreme court.
As reported by World Net Daily, a Christian ministry in Canada was shut down under that nation's hate crimes laws which prevent Christians from expressing biblical opinions.
But in Montana, gay-rights advocates lost an appeal which sought to force a Montana Baptist Church to disclose contributors to the church's battle to support the Montana Marriage Protection Amendment. In the ruling announced in late February, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals protected the identity of the church's donors.
Michael Batts, a certified public accountant in Orlando whose firm specializes in non-profits and serves as the auditor of record for the Florida Baptist Convention, stressed the need for churches to maintain financial credibility and fiduciary responsibility.
He presented an accreditation entity model which is offered to religious organizations and provides standards for financial credibility.
In concluding the think-tank experience, Cloer suggested that churches need a similar advocacy group that would provide better risk management and to "erect a wall of protection and voice at the legislative level."
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