“It is a well-known plot that an administrative commission has been employed to take the ownership and control of the local church property under the auspices of ecclesiastical authority,” says the complaint

An administrative commission for the Synod of Lincoln Trails is exceeding its authority by acting as the synod, the presbytery and the local session in a bitter dispute over property and leadership at Canaan Presbyterian Church in Glenview, Ill., according to a remedial complaint filed with the General Assembly Permanent Judicial Commission.

The complaint was filed on July 6 on behalf of the majority of the Korean congregation’s membership, identified as the Promise group, against the synod commission’s support of the minority, known as the Covenant group. A contingent from the congregation of the complainants held a demonstration a day later at the General Assembly in Minneapolis to draw national attention to the case.

The case involves a bitter dispute within the congregation and between the Promise group and the synod commission. It is also a substantial property fight. The Canaan congregation’s property is valued at $12 million, $8 million net because of $4 million remaining debt.

“It is a well-known plot that an administrative commission has been employed to take the ownership and control of the local church property under the auspices of ecclesiastical authority,” says the complaint, which was written by W. Dan Lee, a Korean-American lawyer in Chicago.

Before the congregation’s internal dispute arose in 2006, Canaan had a membership of more than 1,000. Today, he told The Layman, the Promise group has an active membership of 400 and the Covenant group, about 100.

The complaint says the dispute broke out after the congregation named a Pastor Nominating Committee, action that was approved by the presbytery, to seek a candidate to succeed the retiring Rev. Yong Sam Rhee, Canaan’s pastor since 1976.

“Starting in February of 2006, a group of members, self-identified as CASAMO, wanted to invite pastor they wanted. When their plan was not accepted by the PNC and a great majority of the members, CASAMO began to create factions within the church and instigated conflicts therein.”

Since that splinter movement, the Administrative Commission of the Synod of Lincoln Trails, the respondent in the case, has acted in bias by siding with the Covenant group and recently announced its intention to declare the Promise group in schism, the complaint says. The congregation received a letter from the commission saying that schism action would be taken by August 31.

But Lee told The Layman that the commission could institute that action at any time, one of the reasons he quickly responded with a remedial complaint, which would prohibit the synod from voting on schism while the case is being adjudicated.

Asked why the majority was named the Promise, Lee said he didn’t know – that the naming was by the administrative commission.

The 22-page complaint alleges a number of irregularities, including the threat of a schism vote, which the complaint says is not justified, according to the requirements in the Book of Order. Previous action by the synod declared Rhee, his elders and the Promise majority in renunciation of their vows. The synod also initiated a civil action to force them to leave Canaan, but the Promise has not complied.

The complaint brings Mark Tammen, director of the Constitutional Office of the General Assembly, into the picture. Tammen was one of the authors of the once confidential papers outlining aggressive steps that could be taken administratively or in civil court to seize church property.

“Rev. Mark Tammen … strongly urged the SAC to either take disciplinary actions renouncing Rev. Rhee or dissolve the CPC in order to take the full ownership and control of the CPC property,” the complaint said.

It also alleged that Tammen was involved in “concerted efforts” with synod and presbytery leaders “to assert the ownership and control of the CPC property for the Presbytery and the Synod by dissolving” Canaan Presbyterian Church.”