Miranda Leitsinger/msnbc.com
Occupy Wall Street protesters in Duarte Square in lower Manhattan.
By Miranda Leitsinger, msnbc.com
Updated at 5:30 p.m. ET
NEW YORK, NY --? A?festive and celebratory mood quickly turned tense and angry Saturday as New York police arrested about 50 Occupy Wall Street protesters at?a church-owned lot?demonstrators?had hoped to use as a?camp site.
A dozen or so protesters climbed a wooden?ladder into the fenced?lot at Duarte Square, according to J.A. Myerson, a writer with Truthout.
He said George E. Packard, an Occupy Wall Street supporter and retired Episcopal bishop to the Armed Forces and Chaplaincies, was among those who had used the ladder to enter the site.
About a thousand people gathered across the street, where dozens of police tried to clear sidewalks as?people shouted and screamed at them. Protesters chanted obscenities and screamed: "Make them catch you!"
After the arrests, about 300 protesters made a?blocks-long, late-afternoon march to the church rectory.?
Earlier in the day, demonstrators played drums, cymbals and trombones, held group meetings and waved signs with a variety of messages -- "Disobedience is civil" and "Sorry to inconvenience your apathy" -- as they marked the completion of three?months with a major direct action that could give them a new home as authorities continue to shutter camps nationwide.?
Protesters -- flanked by police officers -- coalesced on a nearly half-acre plot about one mile northwest of their former camp at Zuccotti Park. But their potential new landlord at Duarte Square, Trinity Church, has voiced strong opposition, and the move by Occupy is seen by some as applying strong pressure to them to cave in and let the protesters install themselves.
Under the banner of "Re-Occupy," the protesters said more than 1,400 people -- elders of the civil rights movement, prominent artists, faith leaders and community members -- will help them try and set up camp there after they were evicted from Zuccotti Park on Nov. 15.
"I'm just loving seeing everybody from Zuccotti Park and it really puts an exclamation point on the (question) that's been asked today so many times, 'Do you guys need a space?' ... and the answer is, 'yes.' When you walk around and see the familiar faces and the kindred spirits and the unification of effort, then you realize yes we do need a space so that we can all be together and function as whole as a group and move forward, no doubt," said Thorin Caristo, a 37-year-old protester who is part of an independent livestream team.
It was a festive atmosphere, with people being photographed at the "99% photobooth" and people dancing around musicians and chanting, "Occupy." A group of hunger strikers with a sign reading "Day 15" also gathered at the site.
Miranda Leitsinger/msnbc.com
A protesters plays the drums at Occupy Wall Street's bid to take over a lot in lower Manhattan.
"Outdoor public space plays a crucial role in this civic process and encourages open, transparent organizing in our movement, unbeholden to a broken political system.?As we saw in Liberty Square (Zuccotti Park), outdoor space invites people to listen, speak, share, learn, and act.?It is a source of inspiration and empowerment," Occupy Wall Street said in a statement.
Trinity Church has provided the protesters with meeting rooms and use of their neighborhood center but is opposed to having them stay at the Duarte Square lot. An attempt to move in there on Nov. 15 was rejected by the church.
?In all good conscience and faith, we strongly believe to do so would be wrong, unsafe, unhealthy and potentially injurious,? its rector, The Rev. Dr. James H. Cooper, said in a statement dated Dec. 9 and posted to the church website. ?The health, safety and security problems posed by an encampment here, compounded by winter weather, would dwarf those experienced at Zuccotti Park. Calling this an issue of ?political sanctuary? is manipulative and blind to reality.?
Linda Hanick, a spokeswoman for the church, said earlier this week that their position would not change and on Friday, a statement from the city's bishop sided with Trinity.
The church's operations include an Episcopal parish, a commercial realty business and a grant-making organization.
"Here's a extremely wealthy church ... that can choose between its real estate empire and its conscience. This would be a big help to social justice organizing," Bill Dobbs, of the public relations working group, said Friday.
Miranda Leitsinger/msnbc.com
Occupy think tank working group meets at Duarte Square in lower Manhattan as part of their bid to set up a new camp.
Dobbs said the movement had suffered a ?setback? with the loss of its camp, but the organizing and protests had continued.
Still, ?it sure is helpful to have ? a center of gravity,? he said.
One of the former leaders of the Students for a Democratic Society, Todd Gitlin, said the movement "stands on the sidewalk."
"It's in the process of adjusting to two things: Number one, the loss of camps, and number two, we stand on the brink of an election year," Todd Gitlin, a sociologist and journalism professor, said standing near the fence encircling the proposed new camp. "The eviction means that what was already a major tendency in the movement is even more prominent now, namely decentralism. It's dispersed. Lots of things are going on all the time."
If they don't succeed in taking the lot, Gitlin said he didn't think it was a big deal, noting that Occupy Wall Street had become a more organized structure since it began with events going on all the time: "I think it's always a mistake to judge very much from what happens on a particular day."
The protesters say they?ll do things differently this time with a new camp to prevent problems -- such as a few assaults -- that tainted their efforts at Zuccotti Park. There won?t be personal tents, for example, only large ones for group meetings, said Brendan Burke, 41, of Brooklyn, who helped start the Occupy Wall Street security team.
Ashley Perry, 24, traveled from her home in Tampa, Fla.., to support her New York counterparts.
?This whole occupation has been a lesson in freedom for me," Perry said, adding, "If you still think that you?have your First Amendment rights, go out and try to express them? and see how long it takes for someone to come?and shut you down -- it will happen quickly."
Occupy Wall Street would not be the first of the movement's encampments to set up in a church-owned space: In London, protesters are occupying the forecourt of St Paul?s Cathedral, next to the London Stock Exchange.
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The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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