Jonathan Robert Nelson

Jonathan Nelson practices primarily in the fields of civil litigation and corporate law, with a concentration on the representation of religious institutions. He is a highly-regarded church law practitioner.

Mr. Nelson established an independent law office in 1991, after eight years of practice in corporate litigation and financial transactional work with major law firms in Chicago and New York City.

Over the next twenty-five years, Mr. Nelson represented or advised hundreds of clients in the religious community, including Christian churches of many kinds, a religious order, Hindu temples, Jungians, a Yoruba cultural center, mosques, pastors, church trustees, missionaries, and victims of religious persecution seeking asylum.

Mr. Nelson has advised lay boards and clergy on a wide variety of legal concerns. Mr. Nelson has been a panelist at meetings organized by the American Bar Association and other lawyers’ groups.

He also served as lead counsel in numerous judicial and administrative litigations, including a precedent-setting lawsuit brought by the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church against the City of New York in 2001 to enforce the church’s First Amendmentrights to serve homeless people on the steps of the church.