CHAPTER 268

An Act to amend and reenact § 57-7 of the Code of Virginia, relating to
what transfers of property for religious purposes are valid.

[H 658]
Approved March 18, 1954
Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

tH That § 57-7 of the Code of Virginia be amended and reenacted as
ollows:

§ 57-7. Every conveyance, devise, or dedication shall be valid which,
since the first day of January, seventeen hundred and seventy-seven, has
been made, and every conveyance shall be valid which hereafter shall be
made of land for the use or benefit of any religious congregation as a place
for public worship, or as a burial place, or a residence for a minister, or
for the use or benefit of any church, or religious society, as a residence
for a bishop or other minister or clergyman who, though not in special
charge of a congregation, is yet an officer of such church or religious
society, and employed under its authority and about its business; and
every conveyance shall be valid which may hereafter be made, or has
heretofore been made, of land as a location for a parish house or house
for the meeting of societies or committees of the church or others for the
transaction of business connected with the church or of land as a place
of residence for the sexton of a church, provided such land lies adjacent
to or near by the lot or land on which is situated the church to which it
is designed to be appurtenant; and the land shall be held for such uses
or benefit and for such purposes, and not otherwise. And no gift, grant,
or bequest hereafter made to such church or religious congregation, or
the trustees thereof, shall fail or be declared void for insufficient designa-
tion of the beneficiaries in, or the objects of, any trust annexed to such
gift, grant, or bequest in any case where lawful trustees of such church
or congregation are in existence, or the congregation is capable of securing
the appointment of such trustees upon application as prescribed in the
following section; but such gift, grant, or bequest shall be valid, subject
to the limitation of § 57-12; provided, that whenever the objects of any
such trust shall be undefined or so uncertain as not to admit of specific
enforcement by the chancery courts of the Commonwealth, then such gift,
grant, or bequest shall inure and pass to the trustees of the beneficiary
congregation, to be by them held, managed, and the principal or income
appropriated for the religious and benevolent uses of the congregation,
as such trustees may determine, by and with the approval of the vestry,
board of deacons, board of stewards, or other authorities which, under the
rules or usages of such church or congregation, have charge of the admin-
istration of the temporalities thereof.

Provided that any devise of property, for the use or benefit of any
religious congregation, wherein no specific use or purpose is specified sha
be deemed to be for one of the uses or purposes set forth in this section,
and any such devise heretofore made, under color of which the property
has been held since prior to January one, nineteen hundred fifty-three,
without any proceeding to set the same aside, is hereby validated as
though such devise had been made after the effective date of this act.