Unusual civil trial reflects Episcopal divide- Philadelphia

From the Philadelphia Inquirer. My we are a litigious lot aren't we ?

Just three weeks after a church court ruled that he should be removed from office, Episcopal Bishop Charles E. Bennison Jr. (pictured) faces the start of an unusual civil trial today that could cost the financially struggling Diocese of Pennsylvania millions of dollars.

Bennison, 63, is being sued for damages in Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas by the Rev. David Moyer, who alleges that Bennison used fraud and deception to defrock him as a priest of the diocese six years ago.

Moyer's attorney, John Lewis, said that Moyer v. Bennison appears to be the first trial in American jurisprudence involving "the ecclesiastical discipline of a priest in a hierarchical church."

Bennison's lawyer, Mary Kohart, of the Center City law firm Drinker, Biddle & Reath L.L.P., fought hard to block the trial, arguing repeatedly in county court that the First Amendment bars civil courts from deciding the personnel matters of religious institutions.

But after hearing four pretrial motions to dismiss, Common Pleas Court Judge Thomas Branca last year sided with Moyer, who had argued that he had no other remedy because Bennison had improperly denied him a church trial.

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/front_page/20081020_Unusual_civil_trial_reflects_Episcopal_divide.html