St. Michael's Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church of Woonsocket v. St. Michael's Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Woonsocket

• Decision Date: 25 October 1934
• Citation: 288 Mass. 258,192 N.E. 628
• Parties: ST. MICHAEL'S UKRAINIAN GREEK CATHOLIC CHURCH OF WOONSOCKET, R. L., v. ST. MICHAEL'S UKRAINIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH OF WOONSOCKET, R. I.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

288 Mass. 258

192 N.E. 628

ST. MICHAEL'S UKRAINIAN GREEK CATHOLIC CHURCH OF WOONSOCKET, R. L.,

v.ST. MICHAEL'S UKRAINIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH OF WOONSOCKET, R. I.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Worcester.

Oct. 25, 1934.

Appeal from Superior Court, Worcester County; Williams, Judge.

Suit in equity by St. Michael's Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church of Woonsocket, R. I., against St. Michael's Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Woonsocket, R. I. From an interlocutory and a final decree dismissing the bill, plaintiff appeals.

Affirmed.P. J. Mulvey, of Woonsocket, R. I., for appellant.

S. Silverstein, of Woonsocket, R. I., for appellee.

LUMMUS, Justice.

Both parties are corporations organized under the law of Rhode Island, and located in that state. The plaintiff was organized in 1909 ‘for religious worship and for charitable purposes,’ to hold lands and buildings for such purposes, and ‘to purchase and hold land to be used for the burial of the members of said society.’ Except for the use of the ambiguous word ‘Catholic’ in its name, nothing in its organization indicated or limited its creed. It is conceded, however, that the purpose of those who organized it was to cause the corporation to become affiliated with the Greek Catholic Church, a Uniat Oriental denomination acknowledging the supremacy of the Holy See while retaining its Oriental rites. On January 27, 1914, the corporation obtained and recorded a deed to a parcel of nearly six acres of land in Blackstone, Massachusetts, which was publicly consecrated as a cemetery by a priest of the Greek Catholic Church, the priests of which officiated in the services of the plaintiff corporation until the spring or summer of 1926.

Owing largely to the attempt of the bishop of the Greek Catholic Church in the United States, appointed by the Holy See, to obtain the passage of a bill in the Legislature of Rhode Island incorporating the bishop and the chancellor of the diocese as a corporation authorized to take title to real estate theretofore owned by churches of that denomination, a controversy arose among the members of the plaintiff corporation. At a meeting of the corporation on July 14, 1926, attended by one hundred and twenty-six heads of families belonging to the congregation, a by-law was adopted, putting the business concerns of the corporation, including the appointment and discharge of the pastor, in charge of a board of five trustees elected from the membership. No by-law had made provision for the calling of meetings, but the custom had been to give notice of meetings from the pulpit. The meeting of July 14, 1926, could not be called in that way, for no church services had been held for a month before that date. For that reason, notice of the meeting was given by placards displayed in stores frequented by members of the corporation.

The adherents of the bishop in the congregation comprised twenty-five families, while his opponents consisted of two hundred and sixty-five families. In August, 1926, the superior court of Rhode Island granted a temporary injunction restraining the bishop from interfering with the possession of the property of the plaintiff corporation in Rhode Island, and from interfering with the right of that corporation to appoint a pastor; and on appeal to the Supreme Court that action was affirmed. St. Michael's Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church v. Bohachewsky, 48 R. I. 234, 136 A. 878. Immediately afterwards, the opponents of the bishop took possession of all the property of the corporation, including the cemetery in Massachusetts. Thereafter the officiating priests were exclusively those of the Orthodox Eastern Church, otherwise called the Greek Orthodox Church, which does not acknowledge the supremacy of the Holy See. The adherents of the bishop went to another place for worship.

On August 15, 1928, at a meeting of the plaintiff corporation of which notice had been given from the pulpit, at which meeting more than two hundred members attended, it was voted to obtain a charter for a new religious corporation and to transfer to that new corporation for a nominal consideration all the property of the plaintiff. Accordingly, the defendant corporation was formed on December 4, 1928, and on June 31, 1929, received from the plaintiff a deed of the cemetery in Blackstone which was recorded on August 22, 1929. None of the adherents of the bishop were present at the meeting, for none of them had taken any part in the affairs of the plaintiff corporation since 1926. From the beginning of the controversy in the summer of 1926, none of those adherents were buried in the cemetery, although forty-one members of the...