All Saints Episcopal Church

I didn't expect for this to happen, but I found a church. Found in the sense of "fell in love with and kept coming back to." Whodathunk?! But All Saints is awesome. I feel like I understand my Episcopal friend Brede better now.

So I've been to All Saints the last three Sundays. Yes--three! That's more services I've attended consecutively since middle school. Hooray! The real reason I came that first day was to sing in the choir. My Mom gets the All Saints newsletter and the blurb in the back said "Summer Choir Continues! All tuneful voices are welcome to sing any or all of the Sundays through September 5." Seeing as I might be working with a choir in South Africa and have never sang with one before, it seemed like the perfect opportunity to combine two of my summer goals--go to new churches and learn how choirs operate! And I was totally right.

The first day, about three and a half weeks ago, I found the choir room and tentatively sat with the altos. Seeing as I had never sung a note in an organized manner in my life, I figured, hey, I probably can't sing too high and I'm a girl, so I'm probably an alto. I sat next to one of the nicest women ever, who soon suggested that we fill in to the front. So there I was, first choir rehearsal ever, and I'm in the front row! Plus this woman, Susan, started asking questions about me, what I do, my singing experience (um... none), etc. Somehow luck had it that Susan was very experienced and knew about everyone in the All Saints Community. By the end of the service she was introducing me to anyone I might have wanted to meet, including the South African priest and the lovely woman who warmed up the choir, Zanaida.

I won't bore you with the details of choir practice, but it was fun, we rehearsed upstairs with the organ, then put on choir robes! and sung our service. Walking and singing was a little tough, but I'm getting a handle on it.

choir robes!

What fun. At the end of that first service, I had met a lot of people and gotten a hang of it. Plus Zanaida and I were going to have a voice lesson! Hooray! That lesson was really awesome and during it I learned that... lo and behold... I'm a soprano! Oops. Live and learn. 

So for the second service, I sang soprano. Glory be to God. At that second service (August 1), Susan Russell preached. She was great; she talked about spring cleaning for the church and mentioned her and her wife's approach to cleaning their garage. The third service (August 8), was preached by Zelda Kennedy, a very powerful black woman speaker who relied pretty heavily on scripture, which was less my cup of tea than Susan Russell's general morals etc., but still interesting. I enjoy the services, though my mom has a point in that there is a LOT of standing and sitting during the service. (doesn't bother me that much, cuz we have to stand to sing anyway) I take Communion during the service, because, well everybody does! Everyone gets to eat the wafer and taste the wine! No "you must have been baptized yet" business. I like that inclusiveness (Catholics - 0, Episcopalians-1). At the last service I even got to lead the sopranos to communion! Woo. 

The view from where I take communion...

Excellent. It must be noted that All Saints is SUPER liberal. And maybe that's why I like it. Every Sunday they have an "Action Table" where congregants can write letters to their senators and representatives about things like the recent Arizona law, or the death penalty, or gay marriage! In that realm, the church even has a group for gay congregants. (= super liberal) 

So overall, a pretty awesome church. I'll be there again this Sunday, tragically for the last time until next summer, but I've had a ball so far and I've learned a lot about singing and how great Christian/Episcopal churches can be. Great success.

Beth Chayim Chadashim

Last Friday, I dragged another good friend of mine, Laurel, to her first Jewish experience... ever. Unfortunately, it was not really indicative of Jewish synagogues in general in this world. But there is always hope :) It's called Beth Chayim Chadashim and it's significantly south-west of where I live, towards the ocean, at 6000 W. Pico Blvd. I first heard about it from this article: http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jun/26/local/la-me-beliefs-cantor-20100626 (L.A. synagogue hires first cantor ordained in Germany since WWII). Thanks to answers.com, it became clear that a cantor is "the Jewish religious official who leads the musical part of a service." And musical it was. I specifically chose last Friday because it was the last Friday of July, which, according to the schedule meant it was a specifically musical Shabbat service. Score! In addition, Beth Chayim Chadashim was, I believe, the first synagogue founded for and by LGBT Jews (in the world? something like that. So yes, most (though not all, obviously) of the congregants were queer/gay/bisexual.

Laurel and I found parking and walked up to the building. But for the name emblazoned on the wall, it was otherwise unremarkable: no windows, a single security official sitting on a folding chair outside the door... and a clarinetist on the sidewalk? The music began before we even got in the door! The wonderful Zack Lodmer, the "guest musician" of the service was warming up on his clarinet outside, looking for all the world like a Jewish busker, complete with yamaka and jazz riffs (minus cap for money). 

...and then our clarinetist:

Bizarrely enough, the elderly woman he was shaking the hand of had been attacked by a dog while walking there and was bleeding from the cheek upon arrival. She seemed to think that I worked there because I was standing outside. I encouraged her to go in and get bandaids and wash the growing amount of blood on her face and hand. 

Inside, it was a very intimate setting, and sadly I took the advice of my friend Sarah and did not take any pictures of the actual inside. But the congregation is moving to a new building in a couple of weeks anyway so were you to visit anytime in the future, it wouldn't look like this anyway. We were eagerly greeted by a nice man who encouraged us to look around and partake in the copious cheeses and grapes and DELICIOUS white wine which tasted like juice and which I am desperate to buy for myself.

The small entrance lobby-room opened into a larger room with about 60-70 chairs in a semi-circle around a raised platform which sufficed as a stage. Behind the little stage were two Torahs in a plastic case and some narrow but long horizontal stained glass with images of waves, candles, and the Torah. Sitting on the stage were Rabbi Lisa Edwards, Cantor Juval Porat on guitar (famous from that article), and previously-mentioned Zack on clarinet. We began, strangely enough, with the rabbi fighting with a speakerphone set at the front of the stage so congregants could listen to services from their home! A great idea, except for one point during the service when someone seemed to be having a conversation w/o their phone on mute, so we could hear it--oops. The service began at 8pm and the entire first hour was music. We both were given prayer-books which opened right to left and were all written in Hebrew and, thankfully, phonetic Hebrew. We began with "A New Song to God: Psalm 96" to celebrate "Ruach Chayim": "Spirit of Life." The cantor played chords on guitar and sang through a little wireless mic attached to his cheek and Zack, the clarinetist, began riffing. And not just regular stuff. He was a regular Gershwin! He was clearly not using written music and was throwing jazz riffs around and bending notes like nothing I'd heard since Rhapsody in Blue. He accompanied the cantor on most songs. Laurel and I mumbled through the words, me more so than her (I've been practicing singing, as my next post will explain).

There were various prayers given, for one of which we all stood up and faced the door (east?). New members of the church were welcomed to the front to light candles. The rabbi asked us to pray for family, lovers, partners, etc. She was very inclusive, which was nice. A note I made of her prayer:

"May we say the words we need to say to one another. May we be who we say we are."

Great words. The rabbi then read some Walt Whitman (woo, lgbt synagogue. no need to read this whole passage if you're just skimming this blog entry): "This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body."

[back to me now, goodbye Walt] After more than an hour of wonderful, everyone-singing music, Rabbi Lisa Edwards did her short sermon. She began by talking about her wife, Tracy, and how when the two of them travel, they have difficulty remembering to bring along all the power of attorney forms, etc., which prove that they are married for states that don't recognize their marriage. But they only remember the forms about 50% of the time. She then likened that experience to what is going on in Arizona now, and how immigrants would have to have their papers on their person at all times and how difficult and dehumanizing that was. She then turned uss to the Torah Verse of the Week: "So circumcise the foreskin of your heart, your neck you are not to keep-hard anymore." And while I'm a mature college grad, I was barely able to not snicker the first time I read it. And was definitely curious about how that quote would relate to the Rabbi's talk. And indeed, we got it. She explained that Jewish values promise that God loves the stranger and so must you. You must circumcise your heart and no longer keep your neck stiff. Now I will explain this for you. Circumcise is a. a sign of a covenant with God (okay) and also b. traditionally gendered (like orthodox Jews :-/ ). But when it is the circumcision of your heart, it is not just for men. You need to cut away the thickness and allow the softness to come through (yes, we are not talking about a penis here, but your heart. Do your best to follow along.) Stiffening your neck, then, is about being able to look behind you and see where you come from! Which everyone benefits from doing, she said, as no one got to where they are now without help. The rabbi talked about the biggest pride march that happened in Jeruselum the week before, and how the deputy mayor of Jeruselum helped lead a counter-protest (ugh). The counter-protest apparently had a sign that had a picture of a donkey in reference to the "bestial nature" of homosexuality. But, as the rabbi pointed out, in the Torah there is a passage where a donkey is the only one who sees the angel and it actually even speaks its wisdom. So boo yah. It is important that we trim away our shell of fear and defenselessness. She tied it all together by saying that we all know how it feels to carry documents or not have them, and that it is important that we bond together in efforts to better humanity. What a great sermon! Short but sweet.

The entire service was actually about two hours long, as there was a big ceremony of consoling mourners: "may their memory bring you peace, give you strength, and be a blessing," and everyone touching everyone else to reach to the Hallah bread, which was very tasty. Laurel and I practically had a whole meal of breads, cheeses, grapes, and wine during Shabbat services. Yum.

Overall a very pleasant (albeit a little long) experience. Everyone was very friendly and I think I figured out how to pronounce a lot of Hebrew by the end! (though I hadn't a clue what it meant unless there was an English translation)

Shabbat Shalom, everybody.

Church of Scientology of Los Angeles

Scientology. Most people I know think of scientology as a religion of crazies, so I decided to go and explore on my own. Apologies for taking so long to write this! I also seem to have misplaced my notes, so forgive me my details. Before entering the huge, looming church of scientology, situated in lovely downtown Hollywood, my loyal friend Nedah and I sat in the car and repeated: "I am happy with my life. I am happy with my life." I had a feeling that, if anything I had heard about scientologists was true, that they would try to convince us otherwise and just wanted to make sure that I remembered.

We thought there was going to be a Sunday service that Wednesday, as the website had led me to believe, but we were wrong. Instead, upon entering, three girls in uniform at the reception desk set us up with a nice woman to give us a little tour. Instead of showing us anywhere much around the huge building, she simply showed us through the small museum of L Ron Hubbard's life. Some of the information was bizarre, in that it talked about minute details of his life yet completely omitted where he went to college, just went into talking "after he graduated from college." (mmm though now wikipedia tells me he never graduated from college... ) I learned that he spent a decent amount of time in South Africa and put forth a position of basic human rights that the museum led me to believe had an effect on the downfall of apartheid (which seems dubious, to be honest). At one point, we held two metal cylinders and were told that the numbers showing meant something about our stress levels... but we got no more details than that. The exhibit was overall rather vague and didn't really tell us anything about what scientology was, though the creed seemed nice and Declaration of Independence-y.

But worry not, dear reader(s)! Our next stop was the nice mini-theater (smaller than Silliflicks, but with nicer armchairs) to watch "Dianetics," the short film introduction. It was just us and an elderly gentleman inside, but extremely loud music blasted out at us right from the beginning. The first ten minutes or so showed generic shots of "innovation" from circa the 1920s, with lots of cogs moving together, typewriters going, steam engines, and the like. We were introduced to three men and the back of L Ron's head. The men were talking about L Ron's new book "Dianetics," and how it was going to revolutionize mental psychological medicinal practices. However, sadly for them, both the AMA and the APA rejected them (after a disturbing scene where the entire APA seemed to sit in a dungeon and watch a lobotomy, rather than try L Ron's new theory--fools! mwah hah hah... (?)). The three gentlemen and the back of L Ron's head decided to instead publish Dianetics to the masses (cue more Americana music and more shots of cogs, this time with printing presses and newspaper articles flashing by). It was a huge success, we were told, and everything was great.

You might be wondering at this point: "What on earth IS Dianetics?" And to be honest, WE WANTED TO KNOW TOO. Because after that 21 minute-long film, we still hadn't a clue. It had something to do with L Ron sitting at a patient's bed and asking how they felt when they fell to the ground after injuring their leg and developing gangrene. Somehow.

Upon leaving the theater, our tour lady found us again, and when we asked her that very question, she said "You can buy it for just 26.99 in our bookstore!" ...oh. Even more confused than before, we allowed her to lead us to the barren "Registration Room," where a single girl in uniform manned a desk, surrounded by other empty desks.

Uniform note: everyone working there wore black pants and a white top. The men all wore the exact same tie, with the knot at the top gray and the rest black. (pssst: they were zipper-ties!) In the Registration Room, we were told that we were going to be administered a series of tests. Yes, this sounded scarier than it was, especially after that lobotomy scene. But it was just an IQ test, personality test, and aptitude test. Oh, and again the test with the metal cylinders (see below). Seeing as we had nothing better to do and were generally mystified about everything, we sat down to the scantrons. About two hours later, we had all of our results!

Nedah with the metal thingys! Being asked things like "define hope."

Nedah and I then got our own personal scientologists to go over our results with. Mine was named Tristan. Tristan was great. He was 19 and had "PEACE" tattooed on his inside wrist (I think it was peace. Though it could have been something else). He was actually from the town next to mine, so we got along dandily. Turns out Nedah and I are both bright chickadees, doing very well on that IQ test. The aptitude scores were incomprehensible, but the personality test results came out in graph-form! With all kinds of categories--from happiness, to compassion, to who knows what else. Nedah and I both had two categories that were in the "dangerous" level. We were both happy people, thanks to our chanting in the parking lot, but my two dangerous categories were "irresponsible" and "critical." Nedah also had "critical," and her second was "withdrawn." I realize that I am a reckless youth at times, but seeing as I don't have a family, I don't find my perceived lack of responsibility (at least as perceived by the CoS) to be a problem. And I told them as such. Tristan seemed to accept that, so we moved on to my critical nature. See, this was a toughie. Yes, I was sitting there being super critical of Scientology. And they were sitting there telling me I was critical! It seems we were both right. And again, it was another category that I didn't really feel I needed to be improved upon. Instead, I learned a little more about... scientology! I learned that the building contains a "purification suite," where you can go to be cleansed of, if I remember correctly: "drugs, alcohol, transfats, smog, and really anything." Tristan did it because he had some kind of a drug problem a couple of years ago (though he's only 19!). Tristan soon afterward had to go, so I was shuffled over to a nice tall British man with scarily blue eyes who offered to sign me up for various expensive classes so I could deal with this problem of being critical. I instead took my chance to drill him about Scientology and Dianetics! Tragically, however, early on in the conversation, I referred to it as "Diuretics." Oops. Not a good impression, mixing up his mental health religion with a drug that makes you urinate. Regardless, I learned about the Scientology cross--8 corners for the 8 dynamics of Scientology Life:

1. The Self
2. Creativity, sex, and procreation (family)
3. Group, society, community
4. Species survival (humankind)
5. Life forms in general
6. Matter
7. Spirit
8. Infinity or Supreme being

I also learned that, while this British gentleman was a Christian Scientologist, in theory there could be Jewish Scientologists as well, though he didn't know of any. In addition, the entire building had perhaps one black person. Which did not help the feeling of unease, as if we were all just lab rats.

I eventually wormed my way out of that eerily deserted registration room and rescued Nedah from the lobby, where another nice Scientologist had tried to talk to her about her feelings by asking her personal questions, completely disregarding that her two flaws according to them were that she is critical and withdrawn. So perhaps not the best move, to ask her very personal questions immediately after accosting her in the lobby. A brief bathroom trip had revealed many perfectly-staged rooms, from L Ron Hubbard's office, preserved as he left it, I can only presume, to a second lobby apparently for people taking classes with the cover of Dianetics all over the place, to many more antiseptic rooms with never-sat-upon furniture. At another point in our adventure, a meeting of CoS employees happened, and it looked a bit like a stampede of young zebras, them all in their black and white, many of whom probably in their late teens, like nice blond Tristan, all heading for some secret meeting room.

  The Hallway, with an employee at a distance

This visit was a fascinating experience. I left with many more questions than when I entered, along with a paralyzing inability to avoid saying diuretics when I meant dianetics. It did make me want to read L Ron's book, but maybe someday in the future. The entire building was huge and made me feel very paranoid, though perhaps that was just the horror stories I had heard about the higher-ups of Scientology. My "auditor," (apparently the term used for scientologists who ask you questions about things to get you to come to terms with your illness/whatever) Tristan, was very nice. I would almost go back just to talk to him longer. Unfortunately, upon leaving I got the distinct feeling that if I returned for a second visit, it would be harder to remain steely critical, as I had entered. They were persuasive about how dianetics worked with the somatic mind, and had I real problems in my life, like infertility or alcoholism, their pitch would have been even more appealing as a way to grow mentally healthy. But for now, I am doing well without Scientology. Nothing was said of the aliens and other bits of Scientology that most people who watch South Park would think of. Everything seemed, well, rather rational. To be honest, Dianetics and Scientology the religion seem totally separate. Dianetics seems like a plausible mental health treatment, and Scientology... still remains a mystery. I suppose I'll just have to try out the CoS in South Africa to compare and learn more.

Apologies again for taking so long to update. To be honest, this visit was a lot to process. Now please don't come after me (or Nedah) with rattlesnakes.

Cathedral of Saint John the Divine

A little over a week ago I attended another church, this one in New York City! A one-day vacation from the religious services of Los Angeles, Ben, Kebra, and I headed out one Saturday morning from New Haven. After just barely finding parking, we walked to the cathedral. This cathedral was much more a real cathedral than last week, the Cathedral of Our Lady of our Lady of Angels. And while last week was the real Catholic cathedral, St. John was Episcopal! ...let's just say those religious designations would not have been anyone's first guess after seeing either building--inside or out.

Another "house of prayer for all people," the Cathedral of St. John the Divine was imposing but in a very different way--more Catholic than a catholic cathedral (what a contrast to the last entry!), it was dark, with buttresses and stained glass windows. But unlike most Catholic churches, St. John had an AIDS memorial, an FDNY memorial, a sweet art exhibition, and some rather surprisingly modern stained glass.

 (and there are Ben and Kebra in this picture of the sanctuary!)

Ben got me to this cathedral with a promise of an AIDS memorial, and I was not disappointed. Within the humongous sanctuary, on the right and past the tribute to American Literature, was a rainbow flag and a book of names of people lost to AIDS. I felt acutely aware of being in New York City--the initial epicenter of the epidemic and where Professor Chauncey lost many friends. Some religions are great, especially the kind that don't call AIDS the "gay disease" and shun hiv positive people.

So nice. Also nice, the awesome wood spike FDNY memorial:

This church had a long long empty stone-floored area leading up to the pews and the various altars. There were entirely separate altars around the stone middle-area. One especially neat place had a guestbook at the entrance, leading into a black tent set up behind the altar area, shielded by huge ornamental stone gargoyles. It was an awesome art exhibit! They had filmed the dinner table of various cultures for a while and set up a holograph-type thing to project, in a sped-up way, those meals. Here is a picture I took at the table we were sitting at, to give you an idea:

It was totally awesome! How cool! And then it turned into a slightly creepy table full of arms!

Kinda creepy, when you think about it. The other coolnesses of the church consisted of some awesome statues, like of Shakespeare, Ghandi, Lincoln,etc.

Neat, right? Note the four people all squished together on the left. The right I think was George Washington, though Hamilton was there somewhere too I think.

Last neat part: The stained glass windows! Ben kept coming up and showing me how they would have a basketball player in stained glass or a hockey player! What fun! Other modern stuff as well, like field hockey and tennis and things not even related to sports!

Sadly, I attended this church before the lovely new iPhone update that allows iPhone zooming! Get ready for even better pictures taken by smart phone!

Apologies for being a bit brief, but as there was no actual service, there were fewer epiphanies, other than that cathedrals don't need to be Catholic! They can be Episcopalian too. Yay New York City.

Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels

The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, on 555 West Temple St in downtown Los Angeles, California, is unlike any cathedral I have ever seen. The first word I wrote in my notebook was "wow," the second, "austere." I went two Mondays ago for the weekday mass with a friend of mine from high school, Nedah. From the outside, it is very Californian, made of solemn tan/yellowish-dyed cement, ala California missions. The main entrance is rather inconspicuous, compared to the rest of the massive building. We learned when we took the tour that it was the Virgin Mary encapsulated in sculpture above the door, the namesake of our lady of the angels, and she was 8ft tall, made of bronze, and not recognizable at first like any Mary I'd seen before. She was in plain garb, which according to our old whizened tour guide meant that it was meant to seem like she had just been surprised from the kitchen and was here to welcome us in. (thanks, traditional gender roles for women) A pleasant surprise about her sculpture was that apparently the artist (Robert Graham) made her face by incorporating a facial characteristic of every race of woman in the world. Not sure exactly how that was possible, but a distinctive face it was nonetheless.

Apparently she was surrounded by the sun and atop the moon. (didn't notice the crescent until he said that)

The huge bronze doors cost $3 million to make and the artist's mother's rosary was embedded into the metal, low enough that you could touch it:

We sped ahead into the service. Our Monday 12:10pm service was attended by a decent crowd, including a large group of 2nd graders from Manhattan Beach, who had just taken their first communion that morning. The priest wore green and the reader (a woman, which is apparently a relatively new development for Catholicism, or at least some of Catholicism) wore bright pink. The sermon was brief, intended to be shorter than a lunch break, it seemed. The message, as best as I remember: God chose the ravens to feed Elijah. Not some pretty birds, but ravens. Symbolism, folks. I was terribly distracted during the service by the gorgeous yet simple decorations. The whole cathedral inside, most noticeably the floor, was slanted towards the gorgeous red marble altar (six tons!) at the front:

And I just can't resist showing you the close-up of what held up this altar:

Whew. We sat in the 50K each pews (thanks wikipedia) and marveled at the windows and the tapestries. The windows were made of alabaster stone, so they let in light without any of the glare. Instead of stained glass windows, there were huge tapestries on the walls, depicting people looking towards the altar as well, along with the slanted floor. Most noticeable was that the people were not just saints and holy people, but normal people as well! Here's a pew:

One of the tapestries even had a little white boy in sneakers!

Notice! He's even wearing shorts. (it's the second tapestry from the left and he's standing next to a black boy wearing tan pants.) Also appreciate the chandeliers, with the three lamps clearly representing the trinity--what might be less noticeable is that the center metal thing was actually a speaker! Because the acoustics were so bizarre, they just decided to rig up a huge speaker system out of every chandelier in the whole place.

The sermon continued. One thing that surprised me was that when the donation plates were passed around, when other churches would usually let newcomers pass it by, this priest instead said: "Especially if it's your first time, please give generously." Not sure how to interpret what that meant for us and stereotypes of Catholicism, Nedah and I let it pass us by.

It was then that I perhaps did something... bad. The time came to take communion and I did not know what to do. I had been told by a Catholic friend many years ago that if I was not baptized, I was not allowed to take communion. However, no one mentioned this at this fine noon service at Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels that morning. The ritual began, with bread and wine given to each congregant who came up to the priest and several female attendants. And I decided, both in the interest of research and experimentation, to go along with it. Now, I can't lie. Those were not the only reasons I did it. It was actually in that moment that I had a kind of epiphany. Maybe it was the grandeur of the place, the very underscored cross at the front, but I felt confident. And I decided to not give in to the shame and guilt inherent in being in a Catholic cathedral and not having been baptized. Being excluded from such a ritual because I had not taken part in another ritual... thinking that I was not allowed to participate gave me an overwhelming sense of guilt. I had heard of Catholic guilt before, but guilt for not being Catholic seemed to be another thing entirely, and what I was experiencing in that moment. And so I did it. I took full communion. No, I did not become Catholic in that moment. And I was not smitten by lightning either. I took the little chewy cracker and sipped the tasty red wine that even the 2nd graders got to sup, and I refused to feel guilty. I participated in a time-honored ritual, paying tribute to a god, perhaps. I did not feel that my not being baptized made my tribute any less worthy. And I decided that I would not be cowed. There was no one to stop me and no one even looked at me twice when I was up there, in line, in front of the priest, or in front of the attendant. Nedah was my only witness, and she stayed back in our pew, unwilling to participate in something so foreign to her beliefs. But I decided that I was practicing openness in doing this project, and that I was going to go along with everything that happened at these services to the fullest of my potential. I don't want to be solely window shopping, but trying things on as well. With no intention to buy, still similar to window shopping, but more like at least pretending for a second that I owned that article of clothing, that thing I was trying on that I saw in the window, in this case Catholicism, and trying to see what it would feel like. Metaphors aside, I felt the guilt wash away from me, then come back a bit, like a wave tends to do in a Catholic cathedral, and then I decided that what was done was done, and refused to listen to it again.

After the service, Nedah and I went and joined the 1pm tour of the cathedral. I have never felt so educated about a building. The tour was long, but when I say long, I mean LONG. It was TWO HOURS LONG. That is one LONG tour of a cathedral. And while at the end I felt like I was going to start chewing the soles of my shoes I was so hungry, I did learn a lot about this cathedral, and even cathedrals in general. For instance! We learned that whenever a cathedral is founded, the constellations of the night it is dedicated are recorded somewhere on the grounds. We learned that the Hearst Castle donated the biggest bell of the cathedral, and that a small bell in the corner never rings and is a memorial to the man who built the wall. We learned that there are 42 languages of the Los Angeles archdiocese covered by this cathedral, the biggest archdiocese in the country. The cathedral's mantra "a house of prayer for all people" was taken far more seriously than I had imagined. On the plaza was a Jerusalem fountain, in honor of the Jewish community. The twelve palm trees of the plaza, which could hold 5,000 people for dinner, represented the twelve apostles.

We learned about the baptism pool inside, in explaining it our tour guide said: "we limit it to 20 babies every Sunday. We could do 30 babies, but you can only do so much." (tell me about it! what a large congregation!)

I think this was the world's tallest tapestry. But that's the baptism pool down at the bottom, full of holy water.

Continuing the tour, we learned that a cathedral is called such because inside it is a "cathedra," which is a chair of authority where the bishop sits:

Plus pretty organ pipes!

You can't see from that picture and I felt too weird to take a picture (yes, I'll admit it, I'm kind of afraid of crosses) but between the cathedra and the organ was Jesus on the cross, but the story of that particular art/ornament/talisman/object was really bizarre. The brass statue of Jesus himself was really creepily accurate of what a body would look like having been nailed to a cross for three days. Our tour guide explained in detail about how all the organs move down to the legs and how the pancreas ruptured and how the skin would look after being whipped, etc. It was sculpted by a Jewish sculptor, apparently, and get this: Not only did he try to make it look like a Jewish man on the verge of death. He actually ended up going kind of mad, attempted to put nails through his own hands he got so into this project... and then converted to Catholicism. Creepy, no?

At the ceiling of this huge cathedral there were two red hats that looked like Chinese New Year hats (if such exists). Apparently, those hats are given to a new cardinal by the pope. When the cardinal dies, the hat is hung up in the church and it stays up there--and the cardinal's soul does too--until the hat rots and falls down.

The last 30 minutes of the tour was of the mausoleum in the basement. Very similar to the cemeteries-in-the-walls that I saw in Hong Kong, just way emptier and newer. On our way out, I saw a sweet old Asian man crying by a picture, presumably of his late wife. Silenced, we moved away.

Overall, I've got to say: the Los Angeles Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels is an incredible cathedral. Post-modern in the neatest way, with miniature art galleries inside but surrounding the main indoor room, with tasty wine, remarkable tolerance of Jews (lots of rabbis participated in the dedication and sometimes used the building itself for their own services) and many great stories. Definitely worth the visit.

Stay tuned for a brief respite from Los Angeles-specific places of worship: New York City's Cathedral of St. John the Divine! Exciting stained glass but not Catholic! What is this world coming to!

Saddleback Church - Lake Forest

Sunday June 6, 2010, Saddleback.
What a church. Saddleback Church, of Rick Warren-Obama fame, was quick to join my list of must-see churches in SoCal. And I was not disappointed. The campus would put some small liberal arts colleges to shame--it's a behemoth. To begin our day, Mom and I raced down the 5 South this morning to get there with some semblance of timeliness and were only about five minutes late. We buzzed into a parking lot with a sign about visitors and jumped on a shuttle to the worship center.

The first discussion I heard on the shuttle was between a father and his teenage daughter. I overheard starting at about the time the father was explaining "You can't be Christian in China because it is Communist." His daughter: "what happens to them?" The father paused a moment... "They go to jail." She then replied that she was glad to be in America, where we can believe whatever we want. So while that is not, persay, true (to my knowledge yes the Chinese government regulates religious institutions and possibly also believers who do not toe the government's line, but jailtime is a bit much. From what I found online, a fine is the worst of it.), it did encourage my new exploration of religious faiths, for better or for worse.

Jogging off the shuttle, we noticed people lounging on lawn chairs directly outside the building, while (Christian) rock music blasted. That was, as we learned later, where you could "worship from the suntan area." Oh California. Entering the Worship Hall, the drum set was overpowering. Ricardo Sanchez on vocals and rhythm guitar, plus his band of drums, bass, lead guitar, and backup singers were rocking out hardcore. Awesome. I love it already. We make our way up into stadium seating and appreciate the view, trying to calculate how many people were in that hall (we guessed about 2,000).

And I could have picked a slightly better picture, but this one shows the drums on the big screens and I'm a sucker for drums.

The pastor this morning was (tragically) not the infamous Rick Warren, but the still excellent Teaching Pastor Tom Holladay. His sermon began with a discussion of financial situations and how they can tough. He moved on then to "Five Secrets To Contentment," the topic of the day. We learned that contentment must be learned and is not settling for less. "Give up or gear up." He quickly endeared himself to the audience by discussing his wife and kids. The message of perseverance was a good one, as well as the idea that comparison is the "#1 enemy of contentment." He showed, on the huge screens above his head, pictures of cars and ice cream to illustrate his point. Throughout the sermon, the ushers for the stadium... I mean worship hall, had their heads constantly on pivot, standing and surveying the audience, for what? I do not know. Holladay continued, encouraging us to "keep our lives free from the love of money." His use of technology continued with an adorable video of a dog chasing an ATV. At one point, the dog laid down to wait for the ATV to come back, and mom plus approximately 1,200 people in the audience went AWWW. The moral of the video was that we need to be careful of what we are chasing. Whether the dog caught the ATV of not, both options were not great for him (apparently "he should be chasing a female dog!" -Holladay). We should not pursue things that we don't want because we compare ourselves to others. He encouraged an often re-evaluation of our goals and to find what is really worthwhile in our lives. After a long discussion of such excellent morals and things to strive for, he then veered into how Christ will give us strength to do these things. Sitting there watching the masses, I felt that at that point, it wasn't Christ who gave me faith and strength to do things, but, well, to quote my dear friend Ben Simon, mass movements. Seeing two thousand people inspired to change their lives for the better and do things to make themselves content and to help others... is inspiring. Inspiring of faith. Perhaps that is what humanism is after all. Taking responsibility as humans to do right by ourselves and others. But enough of my own personal revelations.

The sermon ended with a prayer, during which all of the ushers left to man doors and the rock band re-emerged. One last song, as gorgeous as all the ones at the beginning (I forgot to mention the service technically began at 11:15am, but the pastor didn't show up till 11:35am--20 minutes of standing and clapping to great music!), this time Ricardo sang the last verse and chorus in Spanish! How terrible that my year of Spanish only allowed me to pick out "fuimos" and "grace a su amor." Regardless, it was a great touch, and surprised me a bit in that I often imagine conservative Christian ideals to coincide with the english-only movement. But I now know better than to presume.

The end of the service brought on stage the only female to speak into the main mic, a woman who told us that all of our needs could be filled, right there at Saddleback--something along the lines of "want to pray--we have a prayer table, want to be inspired--we have an inspiration table, want to be baptized--we have clothes for you and a beautiful heated pool: we are a full service church." Yes, like jiffy lube. And little did I know, she was not kidding! The campus includes: info booths, 2 ministry offices, 3 huge tents for "smaller" services (but still huge), a grill, a deli, a "refinery" which included a basketball court, more theaters, and a large eating/meeting area, a cafe, two baptism pools including waterfalls, a skateboarding park (I kid you not), and a huge children's center. I was utterly blown away by the vast amount of resources, especially for kids. Things like free tutoring and games after school were totally the norm. I saw why thousands of people were members of this incredible institution.

The baptism pool right outside the entrance to the worship center. The much larger pool was a couple blocks away.

You thought I was kidding. The skatepark.

On our way out of the worship center, I grabbed a "Saddleback Church Cares!" brochure, which listed the support groups. While some looked awesome and so necessary (Hepatitis C, Grief Support, Early Retired with MS, and Breast Cancer), the open share groups made me a little dubious. Yes, there was one for Anger (men and women), and one for Sexual Addiction (men and women). But why was Love & Relationship Addiction (women)? And Financial Issues (men)? Of course only men deal with finances. Just like women are the only ones with love and relationship addiction! Oh, gender stereotypes, how you pain me.

Overall, I was highly impressed by Saddleback. Spit n' polished, the campus was gorgeous. Palm trees, waterfalls, the feeling of being on a tropical island was unavoidable. Ushers kept worship highly ordered, with half a dozen wheelchairs lined up by the aisles, and a decently diverse worshiping community (not all white and fewer old people than some might expect of Orange County--though again this was the 11:15am service, not the 9am). Even the decor of the building was perfect, with the pastor seemingly speaking before where a fireplace might go in a ski lodge, with indoor wintergreen foliage. With good messages of how to achieve contentment and a rocking live band; the sexism and attention-to-detail on such a massive scale (think Disneyland) were the only things that I found slightly unsettling. But I got to witness my second (and third) baptism in just a month! Perhaps I will return someday to try to catch Pastor Rick speaking. But for now, I've had my fill of megachurches. This pic was from inside the refinery, to the upper level where we couldn't go cuz we aren't high schoolers:

Neighborhood Unitarian Universalist Church

This is the picture I took this morning at Neighborhood Unitarian Universalist Church in Pasadena, CA at the 9:30am service on May 30, 2010. Note the gorgeous chalice on the left and the flowers from the flower communion on the right.

The title of the service was "Peaceable Kingdom" and it was led by Reverend Dr. Jim Nelson, a minister with a PhD in Religion from the University of Iowa. He wore his PhD robes during the sermon, along with a piece of cloth like many ministers, this one sewed by a member of the congregation.

I had been to this church several times before, and was pleasantly surprised to see a choir seated at the front upon entering with my mother. Memorable parts of the choral service included "Hymn" which was writen on the order of service without a number... we sang number 1 from the UU hymnal. The choir was good, two songs beginning with a solo and a duet featuring one woman with a highly operatic soprano voice. Noticeable at the end as well was the rather large organ played by Stephen Grimm, the music director.

The sermon. Reverend Nelson began by talking about moments so special they stick in your mind as memories. I felt compelled to come home and write down some of my own, though typing here will have to suffice... things like hunting for worms up in Twin Lakes with a flashlight and grabbing for one while half its body remained in the ground. Or Molly's death. Or the view from the top of Harkness tower, the first time I saw the water, so close to campus and yet so... mentally far away. I will try to think of more such moments later, perhaps. The reverend encouraged us, the congregation, to be in our lives "the bride married to amazement" and "the bridegroom taking the world in his arms." As it was Memorial Day weekend, he spoke of those who have "given their lives for freedom" in this country. And then he made a remarkable turn onto the idea that we should be honoring not just those who gave their lives for freedom (ie in war), but those who lived their lives for freedom. A beautiful turn of phrase and immediately had my full attention. 

As examples, he gave Margaret Fuller and Theodore Parker, two UU heroes. Both living in American in the early 1800s, they fought for the underprivileged. Fuller for equal rights for women and Parker for equal rights for African Americans. Theordore Parker was a UU minister in Boston so virulently anti-abolitionist that he had to preach with a pistol on the pulpit in order to protect himself and the escaped slaves he harbored in his congregation. What a legacy of great UUs. And indeed, both of these two fought for freedom, though neither in war, as it were.

As the reverend said, UUism is less about life after death and more about life before death. He encouraged us to live lives in the fight for freedom. Today was the first service that I remember at the Neighborhood UU church where the "we stand on the side of love" marriage equality banner wasn't mentioned, in the past usually because it was torn down or ripped the night before. UUs are remarkable about fighting for equal rights, from Theodore Parker in the 1830s and 40s to today. I just wish that the diversity celebrated was a bit more evident in the congregations, which are a majority white and elderly. But impressive nonetheless, to see elderly men and women so passionate about the fight for marriage equality. Not all grandparents are tied to that "traditional" view of marriage and thank you UUs for reminding me of that. 

We finished with a "flower communion." A wonderfully sweet idea. I had read online that we were to bring a flower to service, and the reverend directed us all to approach the front and put our flower in a vase, while whispering the name of someone we honor today. I whispered my late grandfather's name. I very much liked the fact that the word "communion" was used... something I would normally associate with Catholicism and getting the blood and body of Christ; I appreciated the new interpretation of it as a ceremony simply full of love and honoring heroes this memorial day weekend. Somehow I always leave UU services feeling a little mentally clearer, with life a little more in perspective. Maybe that's all that spirituality is to me after all.

For next week, research must be done to find another church. Going to my (semi) regular UU one was a nice beginning, but soon I must strike out of my comfort zone into some real religious institution exploration. Onward and upward.

Hello world

This blog is designed to document the "research" I do in the next two months. My goal: attend church services. As many different kinds as possible. Searching for something, perhaps. Like window-shopping, I do not intend to buy or be converted, but simply to see what is available in this miniature world of Los Angeles, California. The initial list of church "types"?

-Unitarian Universalist (my own)
-synagogue: reform, maybe conservative
-black baptist or methodist
-megachurch (Christian)
-mosque
-Catholic mass (hopefully in Spanish)
-youth-directed Christian

That's all for now, look for the first post about the Neighborhood UU church in Pasadena, CA.