When the people of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Lancaster first gathered for prayer a hundred years ago in the offices of a local newspaper publisher, scientists still believed our galaxy comprised the whole universe. The same year, Edwin Hubble, then 35, peered through the new 100-inch telescope atop Mt. Wilson and saw smudges some insisted were mere nebulae which he surmised were other galaxies. Hundreds, millions, tens of millions — as numerous as grains of sand, as the psalmist would say.
Visiting St. Paul’s on Sunday to preside and preach and help celebrate its centenary, I said that while secular understanding had been constricted back then, their founders and forebears, reading scripture, already had access to universal understanding — that God’s scope was infinite, Christ’s mercy was permanent and timeless, and the church’s healing ministry belonged to everyone.
Living fully into and up to God’s vision is of course another matter. These days St. Paul’s people are rising to the challenge magnificently, including in their outreach ministries to the children of enlisted personnel at Christmas as well as those recently emancipated from the foster care system. We had over 150 in church Sunday, including members from two nearby Lutheran churches, St. Stephen’s and Church of the Master.
None can currently afford a full-time priest or pastor, but all three congregations brim with faith and hope and a proven resolve to glorify God and care for God’s people. In consultation with Bishop Brenda Bos of the Southwest California Synod ELCA and my colleagues and me at the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles, parish leaders have gotten out their art-of-the-possible brushes and paints and are discerning about possibilities such as shared sacramental leadership and affordable housing.
But for now, it was party time with these cheerful, resourceful high desert folks. For the last few years, our ostensibly retired colleague the Rev. Jim Seipel, always a cheerful, strong, faithful presence, and his gracious ELCA colleague Pastor James Fuller have been sharing services at Sts. Paul and Stephens, assisted by Pastor Donella Silveria, also retired, who drives all the way from Bakersfield.
All three participated in the liturgy on Sunday. The busy verger, Steve Armitage, who worked on every single space shuttle vehicle as an inspector, found time to serve as my chaplain. The Holy Spirit baptized Simon (him of the white suit who, at 11, is thinking more deeply than the average 21-year-old) and three-year-old Winston and confirmed, received, or reaffirmed three. Mateo and I celebrated our birthdays and played with cars and dinosaurs.
While many hands readied St. Paul’s for its day of days, culminating in a delicious catered BBQ lunch, I sing a song of senior warden Candy Amos. Before retirement, she ran school computer labs, and now, she’s one of the lead programmers, with her patient vestry colleagues, of St. Paul’s’ future. Her late husband, Michael, was in the Air Force, which brought them to the high desert.
Years ago, Candy told me, she lived in Brooklyn, Michigan and attended All Saints Episcopal Church. I said she couldn’t possibly have know my late great-uncle the Rev. Reginald Angus, youngest of my English grandmother’s siblings, from whom I inherited my preternaturally loud voice. Yes, she did, she said with a smile. How small a world is that? Just ask Edwin Hubble.
