§ 782. When property vests; how held

A Baptist church of this State, affiliated with the Vermont Baptist State Convention aforesaid, which has ceased or failed to maintain religious worship or services, or to use the property for religious worship or services, for two consecutive years immediately prior thereto, or whose membership has so diminished in numbers or in financial strength as to render it impossible or impracticable for the church to maintain religious worship or services, or to protect its property from exposure to waste and dilapidation, or to fulfill the purpose for which it was incorporated, may be declared extinct or dissolved, by an order of the Superior Court. The property of the church, or property which may be held in trust for the church, may be transferred to and the title and possession vested in the Vermont Baptist State Convention. The avails of the property so transferred shall be held in trust and added to the permanent fund of the convention and the income employed for its usual work until a local Baptist church is again organized in the same neighborhood, when the income shall be used to aid the local church as needed. (Amended 1973, No. 193 (Adj. Sess.), § 3, eff. April 9, 1974; 2023, No. 6, § 345, eff. July 1, 2023.)