SECTION 1. Every parish in union with the Convention of the Diocese shall be self-supporting, which term shall include the support of a Rector by the regular payment to him or her of stipend, unless he or she be canonically non stipendiary, as may be agreed upon between the Rector and the Vestry, together with the Church Pension Fund premiums thereon.
SECTION 2. Any number of adult persons, no fewer than seventy-five (75) communicants in good standing of this Church in the Diocese, may form a Parish.
SECTION 3. The persons desiring to form a new Parish shall present a petition to that effect to the Bishop to which shall be attached a form of Articles of Incorporation, or Charter, together with appropriate representations satisfactory to the Bishop of their ability to function as a self-supporting Parish. When said application for a Charter shall have received the approval of the Bishop and Chancellor, it shall be proper for said applicants so to incorporate, and to make application to the Convention for admission into union with the Convention. Pending admission into union, no such proposed Parish shall take title to any real estate directly or indirectly, except in the name of the Diocese.
SECTION 4. Every Parish shall be incorporated under the Civil Law of Louisiana and every such act of incorporation or charter shall contain: (a) the name of the corporation; (b) the domicile of the corporation; (c) the objects of the Corporation; (d) the duration of the charter of the Corporation, which shall be for a period not less than ninety-nine (99) years; (e) the person to whom process shall be served; (f) the number of its vestrypersons and wardens; (g) a stipulation that in the event of dissolution of the Corporation or the lapse of its charter, all of its property shall pass to the Diocese; (h) an obligation of conformity to the Constitution and Canons of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America and of the Episcopal Church in the Diocese of Western Louisiana.
SECTION 5. The Bishop of the Diocese, the Chancellor of the Diocese and the President of the Standing Committee of the Diocese shall be ex-officio members of all parish corporations with all corporate membership rights.