Whether the Teschemakers Chapel altar, described as having "sacred meaning and dignity" for the Catholic Church, is a chattel or a fixture could determine if it stays or is moved to the Holy Name Church in Dunedin.
Yesterday, the Environment Court started hearing in Oamaru two separate applications over the altar, which was to be removed last year from the former Catholic girls' boarding school chapel and taken to Dunedin.
Fr Mark Chamberlain, Holy Name Parish priest, applied to set aside an interim enforcement order made by Judge Jon Jackson on August 9 last year which stopped removal of the altar and required an application for resource consent to the Waitaki District Council.
A second application has been filed by Susie Scott - a former Teschemakers' pupil and the granddaughter of Peter McCarthy who, in 1911, gave the homestead and property for the Catholic girls' boarding school - to make the interim order final.
Appearing for Fr Chamberlain, Naylor Love Construction and Trustees Executor Ltd was Paul Cavanagh QC and Michael Nidd and, for Ms Scott, Trevor Shiels and Phil Hope.
The court has to decide whether the altar is a chattel or fixture and, if a fixture, whether a resource consent is needed to remove it.
Fr Chamberlain told the court altars were a significant focus for Catholics. On an altar, bread and wine became the body of Jesus Christ which gave it "sacred dignity and meaning".
The Teschemakers altar had ceased to be used for the purpose for which it was created and he hoped it could be shifted to be used for its original purpose of celebrating Mass.
Mr Cavanagh said the altar was a chattel, owned by the Dominican Sisters' Trust Board which had given it to the Catholic Church and Bishop of Dunedin for use in the Holy Name Church.
The interim order stopping its removal had been made without evidence it was an integral part of and fixture in the chapel, with the result that 12 months later the situation was still unresolved.
The altar was not now and never had been a fixture and could be removed without a resource consent, he said.
Mr Shiels said the court had to determine whether removing the altar amounted to demolition, removal, alteration or addition to the chapel and, under the Waitaki district plan, a resource consent was needed.
He submitted the altar was part of the building, and/or a fixture and required resource consent.
"There is no challenge to the bone fides of Father Chamberlain, the Dominican Sisters or anyone else involved with the chapel or the proposed removal of the altar to Dunedin. The merits of that proposal, or the merits of leaving the altar as part of the chapel are not relevant," he said.
Conflicting evidence was given by a consultant planner, engineer and two stonemasons about whether the altar was a chattel or fixture, how it had been assembled, should be dismantled and if it could be removed without damage.
The chapel is listed as a category B heritage building in the Waitaki district plan, but not individual items such as the altar.
The altar, donated to the Teschemakers by the Hart family, was imported from Italy, and assembled in 1926. When the property was sold in 2000, the Dominican Sisters retained ownership of named chattels in the chapel, which included the altar.
The hearing, which also included visiting the chapel, was before Judge Jane Borthwick and commissioners Charles Manning and John Mills and continues today with closing arguments.
