BALTIMORE (MD)
The Daily Record [Baltimore MD]
April 16, 2026
By Ian Round
Key takeaways:
- Abuse survivors’ lawyers initiated an adversary proceeding against the Archdiocese of Baltimore over church consolidations and property sales.
- Maryland U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michelle Harner issued a temporary injunction halting most Seek the City real estate transactions.
- Bishop Adam Parker testified about the archdiocese’s control over parish mergers and property sales.
- The victims’ committee seeks to declare the archdiocese and its parishes one entity for bankruptcy purposes.
The consolidation of Catholic churches in the Baltimore area — and the related sale of church property — were the subject of an evidentiary hearing Thursday in the Archdiocese of Baltimore‘s bankruptcy case.
Lawyers for survivors of child sexual abuse in the church in late February initiated an “adversary proceeding” against the archdiocese, arguing it has withheld information about its Seek the City to Come initiative, through which 61 parishes in and around Baltimore are being consolidated into 30. The victims say the money from real estate sales should compensate them.
At issue is whether the archdiocese and its affiliated parishes and schools are truly independent of one another and whether the affiliates’ assets should be included in an eventual settlement.
The sale of parish real estate, the committee representing victims argues, implicates the property of the debtor’s estate and should be subject to court oversight and approval in the interests of the creditors. The archdiocese argues that it is a distinct entity independent of its parishes and that parish property does not belong to the archdiocese — notwithstanding the fees churches pay to the archdiocese and the services the archdiocese provides to them.
Seek the City is an initiative launched in 2022 in response to declining attendance and revenue from churches in the city and its inner suburbs. Many churches have closed and sold their assets, and other sales are ongoing.
On April 2, Maryland U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Michelle Harner granted the request, issuing a temporary restraining order pausing most ongoing Seek the City transactions. She ruled that harm to the church is outweighed by potential prejudice to the victims and ordered an evidentiary hearing.
“The Debtor cannot accept all the benefits of chapter 11 while rejecting its burdens,” Harner wrote. “Indeed, the Debtor and its nondebtor affiliates have enjoyed over two and one-half years of protection from state court litigation. And the primary basis of that protection is grounded in the intricate relationship between the Debtor and its nondebtor affiliates and the broad definition of property of the estate.”
Bishop Adam Parker, the archdiocese’s vicar general — essentially its chief operating officer — testified for several hours on Thursday about Seek the City and the archdiocese’s relationship with its parishes. John Matera, the archdiocese’s chief financial officer, testified after Parker.
Parker and Matera described the many ways parishes are entwined with the archdiocese but stressed that they are separate.
“The archdiocese as a corporation sole is its own corporation. It’s its own corporate entity,” Parker told The Daily Record after the hearing. “The parishes and schools in the archdiocese are separately incorporated, and therefore, as civilly incorporated entities, they are entirely separate.”
Parker said he and Archbishop William Lori both serve on the boards of directors for each church within the archdiocese and that they sign documents related to parish real estate sales — even though the parish is the named party to the sale.
Although parish priests initiate mergers and property sales, Parker said, Lori must give final approval. The archdiocese is also involved in the process of “desanctifying” property — churches cannot sell “sacred” property, so it has to be deemed “profane.”
Parker also explained the tax-like payments churches make to the archdiocese, known as the cathedraticum. These funds make up a little over half of the archdiocese’s operating budget, Matera said.
Churches also pay insurance premiums to the archdiocese and pay for lay staff pension obligations. The archdiocese gets 5% of the sale of church property.
Through property sales, churches make up any debt they owe to the archdiocese, which never initiates legal action for past-due obligations, Matera and Parker said. Matera also said that the archdiocese and its affiliates share costs for the affiliates’ legal representation.
Lawyers for the archdiocese maintain that the creditors have been kept in the loop on property sales.
“There has been fulsome disclosure around Seek the City,” said Blake Roth, a lawyer for the archdiocese, at Thursday’s hearing. Roth is a partner at Holland & Knight in Nashville.
Relatedly, the victims’ committee is seeking an order declaring the archdiocese and its affiliated parishes and schools to be one entity. The affiliates have been immune from civil litigation during the bankruptcy, they note, but their assets have not been implicated in the case.
Matera’s testimony is scheduled to continue Monday, and closing arguments are scheduled for Tuesday afternoon. Harner extended the temporary restraining order until after the mini-trial concludes next week.
The parties are scheduled to meet for a virtual hearing on a request by the survivors’ committee to allow a handful of lawsuits against the archdiocese to be filed in civil courts. The attempt to allow a small number of cases to move toward trial — and potentially large jury verdicts — is a strategic effort to force the archdiocese to negotiate a settlement.
Teresa Lancaster, who is both a victim and a lawyer for victims, said during the lunch break Thursday that Parker’s testimony “continue(s) to link the sales of the properties to the archdiocese.”
This story has been updated.
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