Baltimore County has been forced to pay a Kenyan church, Christ is The Answer Ministries based in Milford Mill $375,000 following a religious discrimination suit which the church won at the US Court of Appeals.
According to Baltimore Sun, a dispute between the church and Baltimore County emerged over plans to put up a worship centre in a property along Old Court Road, a move that the county opposed leading to a protracted court battle.
Jesus Christ is the Answer Ministries Inc and Rev. Lucy Ware filed the suit in 2017 and it was dismissed by the lower court. The case was then filed again with the Court of Appeals which overturned the lower court’s ruling.
Rev Ware had purchased the property in 2012 with the intent to put up the church there. However, she failed to get county approval to run the church on the property.
In her petition to court, she argued that Baltimore County by refusal to approve the use of the property as a church was in violation of Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act.
At first, a judge at the US District Court dismissed Ware’s petition on grounds that she could not use the residential home as a church.
Further, the county Board of Appeals remained adamant in reviewing her second plan of the modification of the property to act as a church according to Federal documents.
Her biggest setback in her first petition was that she was required to seek the county’s approval over several other issues including parking.
In 2012, a while after buying the property, neighbours complained after she hosted 40 guests. They alleged that they parked their cars on the grass.
The hearing of the case indicated that Ware was subjected to racial slur after the event given she is a person of colour so were majority of her guests at the cookout in the fall of 2012.
“Since the hearing, neighbors have subjected the Church and its members to a sustained barrage of harassment, including racial slurs,” Judge Albert Diaz, who presided over the case in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit stated.
The zoning board told the US District Court in writing that Ware’s church was in contravention of community guidelines of the area.
Based on this, her petition was thrown out by the court on grounds that she failed “to exercise due diligence before acquiring and altering the property.”
In 2019, the Court of Appeals overturned the lower court’s ruling. Judge Diaz stated that the lower court erred in dismissing Ware’s case.
When she returned to the county appeals board for approval after the Appeals court ruling, her application was approved.
Services at the church are now up.