You meet the most amazing people around the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles, including Ron Chatman, longtime senior warden of St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church in Compton, after our latest lunch at his old hang, Phil Trani’s Fine Food & Spirits in Long Beach…the Rev. Yohanes Cobiellas Toledo, associate rector of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Long Beach, and his spouse, Mariela Castro Tamayo, a postulant for Holy Orders in the Diocese of Cuba…an unidentified individual spotted in the Munger Library at Harvard-Westlake School, where I attended the annual board retreat…after another board meeting, colleagues from The School of Los Angeles, head of school Kenneth Rodgers and board chair Jeannette Zanipatin…the men of Saint Mark’s Episcopal Church in Altadena, who welcomed me at their weekly breakfast in Pasadena…the Rev. John Watson, who presided and preached at our diocesan Ash Wednesday service, and IRIS executive director Troy Elder…and the Rev. Dr. Francisco Garcia, who just received his doctorate in religion from Vanderbilt, to talk about the three legs of his vocational stool: Priest, theologian, and community organizer.
