Churches

CINCINNATI - The Rev. Chris Beard is a theological conservative, make no mistake about it. He believes the Bible is the word of God. He believes the Holy Spirit speaks to him directly. He believes, as an article of faith, that abortion and same-sex marriage are wrong. Still, when a group of religious leaders in Ohio held two days of meetings in Cincinnati recently to talk about economic and racial justice, issues usually associated with the political left, there was Beard, a fourth-generation Pentecostal preacher with a disarming smile, a shaved head and a set of convictions that knock holes in the stereotypes about white evangelical Protestants.

The Rev. Hamel Hartford Brookins, an influential bishop and former pastor of the First African Methodist Episcopal Church of Los Angeles who became a political power broker, civil rights leader and mentor to former Mayor Tom Bradley, the Rev. Jesse Jackson and many others, has died. He was 86. The son of Mississippi sharecroppers, Brookins rose to prominence in the 1960s and '70s as an articulate, self-assured champion of black political empowerment. He died Tuesday at a Los Angeles retirement center where he had been receiving hospice care, a church spokesman said.

Barack Obama announced Saturday that he and his wife had resigned as members of their Chicago church in the wake of controversial remarks from its pulpit that have become a serious distraction to his presidential campaign. In a letter dated Friday to the pastor, the Rev. Otis Moss III, Obama said he and his wife, Michelle, had come to the decision "with some sadness."

Never, perhaps, was there a more fitting program for Jacaranda's motto “music at the edge” than the one served up Sunday evening: two rare works by two iconoclastic Pacific Rim composers, performed almost literally on the Rim itself at Santa Monica's First Presbyterian Church during a solar eclipse. Terry Riley's ground-breaking exercise in repetition “In C” is world-famous, but hardly anyone has ever heard its followup, “Olson III” -  which, incredibly, was receiving its large-scale U.S. premiere.

Organizers of the annual Rainbow Festival were prepared for trouble. The Q Crew, a local "queer/straight alliance," distributed cards telling people what to do if approached by hostile demonstrators. Sympathetic local church groups formed a protective buffer along the festival ground's cyclone fence. Mounted police were on patrol. Jerry Sloan manned a table for Stand Up for Sacramento, a recently formed gay self-defense organization. "So far, so good," he said. "No Russians."

From his pulpit in Santa Ana, Chuck Smith's voice thunders with certainty. He denounces homosexuality as a "perverted lifestyle," finds divine wrath in earthquakes and the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and promises imminent Armageddon in a deep, sure voice. If his message is grim, the founder of the Jesus People and the Calvary Chapel movement bears the ruddy good cheer of a 79-year-old believer who insists he has never known a day's doubt or despair.

After flat-lining twice on the operating table, Pastor Joe Sabolick figured the worst chapter of his life was over. But when he returned to his office at Calvary Chapel of Laguna Beach a few weeks later, the locks had been changed -- and his handpicked church board, including his older brother, had fired him amid allegations that he embezzled money and was "fixated" on the wife and daughter of an assistant pastor.

On Sunday morning in the Pico-Union district of Los Angeles, Father Jarlath Cunnane made the rounds. At a two-story apartment building with barred windows and peeling paint, Cunnane knocked on a door and cheerfully called out a greeting in Spanish to the Salvadoran immigrant who peered out. "Good morning," the Roman Catholic priest said. "I'm Father Jay from St. Thomas, and I'd like you to tell us about your experiences in the neighborhood." The immigrant cracked a welcoming smile.

After nearly 20 years on an impersonal commercial strip, the Cathedral of Christ the King moved to a quiet residential neighborhood in the northwestern edge of this metropolis. Church leaders were eager to be part of a community. Then, on Palm Sunday 2008, they started ringing the church bells every half hour during the day. The complaints soon began, so church leaders cut back the tolling to once per hour. They put up Styrofoam to muffle the sound.

Re "Casting a Critical Eye on Church of Castoffs," Feb. 1: Today and every day in 235 cities some 5,000 recovering drug addicts will gather in Victory Outreach inner-city rehabilitation homes, open their Bibles and learn about the challenges of living the Christian life--sober, responsible and grateful to God. They are free to leave the homes at any time--and some do. Many will stay for nearly a year to complete a strenuous regimen of biblical study...

CINCINNATI - The Rev. Chris Beard is a theological conservative, make no mistake about it. He believes the Bible is the word of God. He believes the Holy Spirit speaks to him directly. He believes, as an article of faith, that abortion and same-sex marriage are wrong. Still, when a group of religious leaders in Ohio held two days of meetings in Cincinnati recently to talk about economic and racial justice, issues usually associated with the political left, there was Beard, a fourth-generation Pentecostal preacher with a disarming smile, a shaved head and a set of convictions that knock holes in the stereotypes about white evangelical Protestants.

Sister Simone Campbell doesn't wear a habit. A nun for more than 40 years and an attorney for 35, the executive director of a Roman Catholic social justice lobby called Network doesn't feel she should wear one. Her voice mail refers to her simply as "Simone," and she hasn't worn the long, gray dress habit since her early days as a nun. Such an approach doesn't sit well with some Catholics. "Love the traditional nun ... I really would like to see the habit back," Patricia Earp, a Catholic, said on Twitter.

SAN ANSELMO, Calif. — Days after President Obama announced his support for same-sex marriage, the Presbyterian Church's Northern California governing body refused to rebuke a retired minister for marrying gays and lesbians when it was legal in California. The Presbytery of the Redwoods, which governs churches from the Golden Gate Bridge to the Oregon border, voted 74 to 18 Tuesday to reject the church's official denunciation and instead support the Rev. Jane Adams Spahr, who had been found guilty by an ecclesiastical court of violating the Presbyterian Constitution and her ordination vows for marrying 16 same-sex couples.

The congregation was quiet — teary-eyed but smiling — as Bill Coburn, in a eulogy to his wife of 62 years, spoke of the passions of his beloved Marian. Travel. Walt Disney's Dopey. Elephants, both real and miniature. Reruns of "The Golden Girls. " Her church. And roses. Marian Stanton Coburn loved roses so much she planted 65 rosebushes in the North Hollywood home where she had lived since 1930. On a chilly, sunny Saturday last month, Bill Coburn managed a small smile as, true to her wishes, his wife's ashes were buried beneath roses in a memorial garden outside St. David's Anglican Church.

Responding to letters to the editor on the dust-up between the Vatican and a group of American nuns, reader Joseph S. David of Brea wrote: "Is it liberal bias that The Times had one columnist and four letter writers castigate the Vatican for its recent call to liberal American nuns to reform, but no one to defend it? "In truth, defense is unnecessary for the offense that is the liberal nuns: flaunting of Roman Catholic doctrines, unfaithfulness to religious vows and a misinterpretation of Vatican II. They forget that when the church's Magisterium (its teaching office)

Nancy Eomurian was driving through a Long Beach church parking lot April 28 when she found a man covered in blood lying on the ground near the lifeless body of his 9-year-old stepdaughter. Next to the child she saw what appeared to be nonsensical scrawl written on the side of a container. "I first thought the scrawl was graffiti, then I realized it was blood," Eomurian said. "It was like time stopped. " Prosecutors allege that the man, 31-year-old Jacinto Zuniga Trujillo, killed the girl out of fear she would reveal that he had been molesting her. The L.A. County district attorney's office accused Trujillo of capital murder and molestation, alleging that he had abused the girl for months.

Already shaken by defections and the formation of breakaway churches in a battle over doctrine, the Pasadena-based Worldwide Church of God reeled Wednesday from yet another fracture, as a group of its highest-ranking pastors organized a new denomination called the United Church of God.

Altar wine, the sweet, high-alcohol nectar poured at church services, may not be the industry's most exciting or lucrative product, but for San Antonio Winery, it's one of its fastest-growing lines. Although the sagging economy has flattened sales of premium wine, the downtown Los Angeles winery has seen its altar wine sales grow, thanks to greater church attendance and an industry consolidation that has forced more wineries out of this niche.

Manuel Vega was in the courtroom when the Los Angeles Archdiocese agreed to pay clergy abuse victims a landmark $660-million settlement. The bailiff had to whisk some of the victims out to make room for all the high-fiving lawyers filing in for their payday, he says. "Some were even chest-bumping," recalls the retired police officer. "To me, it looked like a frat party. " Vega, who says he was molested as a boy by a priest in Oxnard, went along with the settlement only because his attorneys assured him the church would turn over confidential personnel files that would reveal the truth about priest abusers, and those who shielded them, including Cardinal Roger M. Mahony.

MOSCOW — Tens of thousands of people came to the square in front of a Moscow cathedral Sunday in a show of support for the Russian Orthodox Church, which is facing criticism for its close ties to the Kremlin and the wealth of its leaders. Under golden cupolas and a warm spring sun, church leaders dressed in red-and-gold robes carried crosses and icons around the mighty white walls of Christ the Savior Cathedral in a procession led by Patriarch Kirill. "What are we doing, my dears, here today, having gathered in such a multitude?"