NEWARK, N.J. – Today’s nonprofit organizations face a number of complicated issues, ranging from fundraising, to governance, to maintaining an active and involved volunteer base. For religiously affiliated nonprofits, the issues can be even more complex as they seek to balance their legal independence with their relationships with their churches or religious orders. The organizational and financial challenges facing the Catholic Church have received the most media attention, as the Church rethinks its administrative structures and attempts to segregate the assets of its various charities to protect them from the liabilities resulting from recent scandals. To assist church-related nonprofits with the legal, accreditation and contemporary management issues they need to address, Seton Hall University School of Law has launched the Seton Center for Church-Related Nonprofit Corporations.

The mission of the center is to provide independent, scholarly applied legal research on issues of strategic importance for the long-term viability of religiously affiliated nonprofit corporations. The center’s research and services will be available to religious nonprofits of any denomination.

The center’s inaugural conference, “Catholic Charities and the Diocese: Autonomy and Relatedness,” held November 17, drew representatives from Catholic charities and dioceses from 23 states. Archbishop John J. Myers of the Newark Archdiocese, who convened the conference, noted the extraordinary importance of a center designed to aid churches in pursuing their mission among the poor, and indicated how proud he was that such a center was being established in his own archdiocese. Rev. J. Bryan Hehir, the Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor of the Practice of Religion and Public Life at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, and president of Catholic Charities, Archdiocese of Boston, served as the keynote speaker. He reviewed the history of Catholic charities in the United States, stressing the role of charities as institutions rooted in the ministry of the Church but focused on service to the wider civil society. While the challenges charities face are multiple, Hehir expressed confidence in their ability to continue their service to both the Church and society.

“Although Catholic colleges, universities, healthcare and social service corporations represent the largest number of corporations affiliated with one church in the nonprofit sector in the United States, until now there has been no center for independent legal research on issues that impact on the identity and operations of these organizations,” noted Sister Melanie DiPietro, founder of the center. “The goal of the Seton Center for Church-Related Nonprofit Corporations is to contribute to strengthening pluralism in the nonprofit sector by strengthening the participation of Roman Catholic entities in scholarly research and public policy debate.”

Nationwide, there are approximately 230 Catholic colleges and universities, 580 Catholic hospitals, 370 Catholic healthcare centers, 1,540 specialized homes, 270 residential care facilities for children, 1,240 child-care centers, and 2,960 social service organizations.

A member of law firm Buchanan, Ingersoll and Rooney and visiting distinguished practitioner at Seton Hall Law School, Sister DiPietro, both a canonist and civil attorney, represents nonprofit corporations and has published numerous articles on the governance of exempt organizations affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church. In coming to Seton Hall, Sister DiPietro joins a number of Seton Hall Law School faculty members whose research and teaching are dedicated to issues related to nonprofits and religious organizations.

The speakers at the inaugural conference addressed a wide range of challenges Catholic charities face as they carry out their mission of service, including canonical, governance, First Amendment, employment, liability and bankruptcy issues.

Panelists who participated in the conference were:

• Angela Carmella, professor of law, Seton Hall Law School, who serves on the editorial council of the Journal of Church and State and writes extensively on religious clauses in the Constitution and Catholic social thought.
  
• Sister Ann Patrick Conrad, associate professor and former dean of the National Catholic School of Social Service, The Catholic University of America, whose research focuses on professional ethics and Catholic social thought.
  
• Timothy Glynn, professor of law, Seton Hall Law School, whose work centers on corporate law, employment law and civil procedure.
  
• Stephen Lubben, associate professor of law, Seton Hall Law School, an expert on bankruptcy, who currently is serving as principal investigator, under a grant from the American Bankruptcy Institute, for a comprehensive review of professional fees in Chapter 11 cases.
  
• Father Robert Meyer, legal counsel to the Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations, who teaches canon law at Seton Hall Law School.
  
• Charles Sullivan, professor of law, Seton Hall Law School, who has written extensively on employment discrimination, antitrust and contracts, and co-authored four textbooks on employment discrimination law.