Unprecedented turmoil in recent months in local and regional Presbyterian circles — including five lay leaders in a Grand Forks congregation quitting the church after being charged with violating church rules as well as a top administrator being dismissed suddenly — was the main business at a meeting in Casselton, N.D., on Monday.

About 50 clergy and ordained lay elders of the Presbytery of the Northern Plains gathered for the one-day “stated meeting,” one of about three held each year.

Besides the departures, the conflict also included a gag order put in place by a higher church panel that had been lifted, it was announced Monday, as well as a supportive vote for a lay pastor who had vowed earlier this spring to commit “civil disobedience,” in ignoring the gag order.

It all seemed at odds with the quite serene meeting Monday that lasted several hours in Westminster Presbyterian Church, (which happens also to be the home congregation of North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple, the latest of the handful of governors from this prosperous town just west of Fargo.) The Presbytery, based in Grand Forks, includes 64 congregations across northwest Minnesota, all of North Dakota and one site in Montana.

Michael Lochow, the stated clerk for the Presbytery, reported on the settlement reached with the Rev. Steve Minnema, the interim executive presbyter, or administrator, who was suddenly dismissed Nov. 5 by the Presbytery’s council. Hired two years ago, Minnema challenged his dismissal to a higher church panel in the Twin Cities. He was reinstated pending a review.

The settlement agreement finalized in April paid him 60-days severance salary, 18 days of unused vacation and his pension and health benefits through April 15. That ends the matter, Lochow told the meeting, adding for the first time some details on what was behind the dismissal.

The sudden termination was based on complaints about Minnema’s leadership and management style, although other church members liked his work and personality, Lochow told the meeting, adding he could not go into much detail on such a personnel issue.

But it apparently involved conflicts he had with members in the church in Grand Forks, which houses the Presbytery’s office, according to church documents.

Lochow, a Fargo attorney, reported Monday on the church action taken against five lay leaders, or elders, of First Presbyterian Church in Grand Forks. He said on Jan. 31, “allegations of offense” were filed against the five with the Presbytery, which “assumed jurisdiction” of the case at the request of Grand Forks congregation’s leadership, including the Rev. Gretchen Graf.

As the investigation into the allegations began in February, four of the five elders “renounced jurisdiction of the Presbyterian Church (U.S. A.),” Lochow said.

The uniquely Presbyterian language means, in effect, the four elders gave up their membership not only in their congregation but in the denomination. The fifth elder was charged with “violating the principle of Presbyterian government, promoting conflict and polarization of the congregation of First Presbyterian . . . and violation of ordination vows,” Lochow said in reading his report to the meeting.

As serious and legalistic as the charges might sound, they referred basically to causing continual “disturbances” and disharmony in the congregation, and not any kind of legal malfeasance, Lochow explained.