§ 17-a. Property of extinct Seventh Day Baptist churches and Seventh
Day Baptist religious societies. 1. All property, both personal and
real, belonging to or held in trust for any Seventh Day Baptist church
or any Seventh Day Baptist religious society that has or shall become
extinct shall vest in and become the property of the Seventh Day Baptist
missionary society and its successors and assigns; provided that this
section shall not affect the reversionary interest of any person or
corporation in said property or any valid lien thereon.

2. Any Seventh Day Baptist church or any Seventh Day Baptist religious
society in this state which has ceased or failed, or which shall cease
or fail, to maintain religious worship or services, or to use its
property for religious worship or services, according to the tenets,
usages and customs of Seventh Day Baptist churches which are members of
the Seventh Day Baptist general conference, for the space of two
consecutive years immediately prior to application to the supreme court
of the state for an order dissolving said church or society as herein
provided, or whose membership has so diminished or shall so diminish in
numbers or in financial strength as to render it impossible or
impracticable for such church or society to maintain religious worship
or services or to protect its property from exposure to waste or
dilapidation, or to fulfill the purpose for which it was incorporated,
shall be deemed and taken to be extinct, and may, by order of the
supreme court of the state, be so declared and thereupon dissolved, and
the property of such church or society may, by said order, be
transferred to, and the title and possession thereof vested in, said
Seventh Day Baptist missionary society.

3. An application for such an order and disposition of property may be
made by any member, trustee, or officer of said Seventh Day Baptist
missionary society, or any member of such church or society, when duly
authorized thereto by the board of trustees of said Seventh Day Baptist
missionary society, upon a verified petition setting forth the facts
authorizing such order and disposition of property. Upon the
presentation of such petition to the supreme court of the state, such
court may proceed in a summary manner after such notice as the court may
prescribe, to inquire into the merits of such application, and if, upon
examination by the court, it shall satisfactorily appear that the making
of the order and the disposition of property applied for is necessary
and proper, for any of the causes mentioned in subdivision two of this
section, such court shall make a final order declaring such church or
society extinct and dissolving the same and transferring any property
and the title and possession thereof, which may belong to such church or
society, to and vesting the same in said Seventh Day Baptist missionary
society, it being the purpose and intent of this section to preserve to
the Seventh Day Baptist denomination all property owned by or held in
trust for any such church or society for religious purposes.