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SAVANNAH: Christ Church Anglican to move into new home Feb. 1
By Jan Skutch
Savannah Morning News
http://savannahnow.com/news/
January 24, 2015
Christ Church Anglican will end its three-year worship arrangement with Independent Presbyterian Church on Sunday before moving to its own church at a new site on Feb. 1.
The congregation, which left historic Christ Church on Johnson Square in 2011, has gathered to worship at the 207 Bull St. facility since. The congregation will leave the Bull Street site at 10:45 a.m. Sunday and proceed to its new location at Bull and 37th streets.
The first services there will be at 8 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. Feb 1, said the Rev. Marc Robertson, senior pastor.
The church's new home is in the newly renovated 100-year-old church building that was originally home to Hull Presbyterian Church. It most recently was owned by the Christian Revival and Restoration Center.
"The hospitality of the Rev. Terry Johnson and the people of Independent Presbyterian Church has been overwhelming," Robertson said. "I could not be more thankful for these past three years or more excited about our future."
He said the new location is in a building formerly used by the Rev. Freddie Hebron, whom he called a close friend and partner in ministry.
"It is an honor to be in the same building where he preached," Robertson said. "What's more we are thrilled with the opportunity to bring together our congregation with our friends from the Christian Revival Center."
The move comes several years after a dispute over doctrine with the Episcopal Church at Christ Church led the Anglican congregation to disaffiliate itself with the Episcopalian Church.
In September 2007, the local church's leadership voted to leave the national group and keep the church property at Christ Church and align itself with conservative Anglican congregations in Africa.
The Episcopal Diocese of Georgia filed suit the same year asking the court, among other things, to declare that all property of Christ Church was held in trust by the Diocese of Georgia for the Episcopal Church.
Three courts, beginning with Chatham County Superior Court Judge Michael Karpf and followed by the Georgia Court of Appeals, ruled with the Episcopal church and against the Anglican congregation.
In the end, Episcopal Diocese of Georgia retained all endowment funds, property and assets of Christ Church Episcopal and exclusive right to use the designations of "Christ Church, Savannah," and "the Mother Church of Georgia."
The Anglican congregation that separated from the Episcopal Church during the legal battle then incorporated as Christ Church Anglican. It relinquished the Johnson Square property in December 2011 after the Georgia Supreme Court ruled against them.
Its more than 400 members walked down Bull Street after a final service on Dec. 11, 2011, and moved its services to the Independent Presbyterian site.
Robertson said the Anglican congregation has retained property at Drayton and 37th streets that initially had been considered for the new church site and renamed it the Whitefield Center, an urban mission.
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