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Members of a church congregation who lost a fight to worship in their longtime home now face a battle over the location of their new sanctuary.
Christ Church Anglican, established by a group that separated from Savannah’s historic Christ Church five years ago over “profound and irreconcilable theological differences,” plans to build a sanctuary and parish hall on the northeast corner of Drayton and 37th streets.
Church representatives obtained three of four variance requests for the project Thursday from the Zoning Board of Appeals.
The hearing was contentious, however. The plans pitted church members against neighborhood residents — and neighbors against neighbors in some instances. The project faces additional review by the staff of the Metropolitan Planning Commission and the Savannah city manager's office and could be subject to additional public hearings before construction can begin.
“We’re taking it one step at a time,” said the Rev. Marcus Robertson, the church’s rector. “The challenge for us is to communicate to the neighborhood that we really are on their side. We’re not out to pick a fight.”
The size and scale of Christ Church Anglican’s plans for the site elicited plenty of angst Thursday. Plans submitted to the MPC call for a campus encompassing approximately two-thirds of the 100 block of East 37th Street between Drayton and Abercorn streets.
The project would involve moving the lone existing structure, the historic Merriwicke house, to the eastern edge of the site and building a sanctuary and parish hall measuring a combined 12,600 square feet.
The shape of the 23,000-square-foot lot dictates the church face Drayton Street and not 37th Street, as neighboring structures do.
With the main entrance on Drayton — the main north-south arterial street through the area — the church would utilize East 36th Lane as its main drop-off point. The lane is currently unpaved and sees limited traffic.
“Our contention is this is a very, very large building that will create tons of traffic in the lane,” Bruce Arnsdorff told the zoning board. He lives at 111 E. 36th St., across the alley from the proposed church site.
“The church keeps using the word neighborly. There’s nothing neighborly about this building,” said Jason Cobb, whose family operates the antique store next door to the site on 37th Street. “It’s taking over.”
Other neighborhood residents spoke in support of the church.
LaRaine Papa Montgomery, who lives one block south and is a member of Christ Church Anglican, predicted the new church would “increase property values, beautify the corner and add to the architectural fabric of the neighborhood.”
Robertson stressed the church’s intention is not to “change lives detrimentally in any way.”
“We hope to make new friends,” he said.
Christ Church Anglican has been a congregation without a permanent home since Dec. 18, 2011. The 300-plus member group vacated the historic Christ Church building on Johnson Square following services that Sunday and since have met at the nearby Independent Presbyterian Church.
The congregation left the Johnson Square church in compliance with a Georgia Supreme Court order that ruled the church property and its endowment belonged to the Episcopal Church and the Diocese of Georgia, not the breakaway congregation.
The dispute dates to March 2006, when approximately 87 percent of the congregation voted to split from the Episcopal denomination. The group was among hundreds to break away in the years following the consecration of the church’s first gay bishop in 2003.
The breakaway group continued to meet in the Johnson Square church while the 75 or so members of the congregation who voted against the split began meeting at an Episcopal church in Ardsley Park. Those parishioners returned to Christ Church once the state high court ruled it belonged to the Episcopal Diocese of Georgia.
Christ Church Anglican was drawn to the 37th Street site because “historically and culturally we are a city church,” Robertson said. The church has the property under contract for sale but has yet to close on the purchase.