Late last week, a bankruptcy judge ruled that the Archdiocese of Portland owns its property:

A bankruptcy judge ruled Friday that the Archdiocese of Portland, not its parishes, owns church assets, dealing a major blow to its efforts to protect church property from lawsuits filed by alleged victims of priest sex abuse.

The Portland archdiocese became the first in the nation to declare bankruptcy when it filed for protection from creditors in July 2004, just before the scheduled start of jury trials for victims seeking more than $155 million in damages.

Since then, the archdiocese has been trying to protect church buildings throughout Western Oregon from being included in settlements with alleged victims, arguing that the properties are owned by individual parishes, and not the archdiocese.

Dozens of abuse claims are still pending against the archdiocese, seeking at least $400 million in damages.

The ruling by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Elizabeth Perris settles one of the main questions on the bankruptcy — whether accepting the jurisdiction of a federal court might violate the First Amendment rights of the church to the “free exercise” of religion by forcing it to ignore church law on ownership.

“There is no First Amendment impediment to this court’s jurisdiction,” Perris wrote.

The ruling means that in principle, the archdiocese could be forced to sell off church properties to pay settlements or court awards to sex abuse victims. However, Perris left open the question of whether the sale of individual church properties could pose an unfair burden on the practice of religion under the Religious Freedom and Restoration Act of 1993.