Advertisement

Churches Seek Ways to Build Understanding

Share
Times Staff Writer

Members of the Korean American and African American communities met over fried chicken and rice cakes to swap information on two shared interests: business and God.

The formal intent of the forum, held Thursday evening at the African American Museum, was to address economic development of South Los Angeles by way of faith-based organizations.

But more than that, the meeting aimed to start a dialogue between two groups whose past was beset with tension and misunderstanding, said event organizer Tae H. Kim, who attends Oriental Mission Church.

Advertisement

“Under God, we are one race,” said Kim, the lone Asian American in the Crenshaw Chamber of Commerce. While working in a predominantly black area, he said, he realized the need for exactly this type of meeting, which he hopes will be the first of many.

No specific plans were decided on, but Kim said just getting to know each other was a step toward a better future.

Bishop Charles E. Blake and the Rev. Dong Sun Lim spoke to the crowd about their respective churches and the need to fuse the two communities.

Blake’s West Angeles Church of God in Christ includes a congregation 24,000 strong, while Lim has about 7,000 people on the roster at Oriental Mission Church. Both pastors said their organizations have annual budgets of more than $10 million and use that money to create businesses and programs that serve their areas.

Gatherings between Korean and black groups were popular immediately after the 1992 riots but later dwindled, said Charles E. Blake II, who was at the forum to support his father. He said the more the two communities establish a relationship through commonalities -- both, he noted, are “called to love thy neighbor” -- the easier it will be to stand together during periods of turmoil.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa told the 200 attendees that it pleased him to see the communities reaching out to each other and that he would support their efforts. This new relationship, he said, can be a phoenix rising from the ashes of their rocky history.

Advertisement

Although Blake and Lim’s speeches were scheduled as the main event, networking seemed to be the priority for many.

“Everyone came here to schmooze,” said Angela Killoren, associate director for USC’s Center for Asian-Pacific Leadership. Men and women in business attire trickled in slowly that night, hitting the buffet table lined with soul food and food from Seoul before they reached for their business cards.

As the event wound down, Lim begged the audience not to neglect their new friends.

Kim plans to hold another forum in October -- this time adding the Latino community.

“If God can help us, it will be easier to overcome these barriers,” he said.

4th Area Church Aligns With Bishop in Uganda

In yet another snub of the national Episcopal Church, a La Crescenta church this week announced its realignment with a more orthodox diocese in Uganda -- a move the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles plans to challenge legally.

St. Luke’s of the Mountains Church follows a path taken by parishes in Long Beach, Newport Beach and North Hollywood. They too aligned themselves with a conservative Anglican bishop in Uganda, about 1 1/2 years ago.

The Los Angeles diocese then sued those parishes for rights to their houses of worship and other property, citing canon and state law.

But judges have ruled that the breakaway parishes rightfully owned church buildings and other property. The six-county diocese is appealing.

Advertisement

Although those congregations pointed toward the Episcopal Church’s support for the ordination of homosexual clergy as a reason for their secession, that is not the case here, said Tim Kelly, a spokesman for St. Luke’s.

The parish’s congregants think the U.S. Episcopal Church has strayed from a traditional tenet of the denomination: “that Jesus Christ is the only way to God, not a way,” Kelly said. He added that they also decry the treatment of the Bible by the national church, which he said emphasizes some topics and downplays others according to what it finds convenient.

For St. Luke’s, the Bible is the only authority, he said.

St. Luke’s leaders and the parish -- more than 90% of whom voted in favor of withdrawal -- were “just staying the course” by realigning with a more orthodox diocese, Kelly said.

The church has worked closely with the Ugandan Diocese of Luweero for 15 years, building an orphanage and a school, he said.

In a statement released by the Rt. Rev. J. Jon Bruno, the bishop said “it is a painful matter ... to know that they have abandoned all attempts at reconciliation, which is at the heart of our Christian witness.”

“I thought we’d come to the place where we agreed to disagree,” Bruno said Wednesday, adding that he was hurt that church officials didn’t speak with him first. “They just sent a fax.”

Advertisement

The U.S. Episcopal Church constitutes about 3% of the world’s Anglican Communion, which has about 77 million members. Kelly said the Diocese of Luweero reflects the principles held by the majority of the religion’s adherents.

Church of England Apologizes for Slavery

The mother church of the Anglican Communion -- the Church of England -- has apologized for slavery and expressed regret that its members once profited from it.

Church leaders unanimously approved the apology at their biennial General Synod meeting in London, nearly 200 years after Britain adopted the Slave Trade Act of 1807. The act did not abolish slavery, but it prohibited British ships from carrying slaves.

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams stressed that the apology wasn’t “about political correctness” but was about repentance.

The church profited from the dehumanization of more than 10 million Africans, and therefore had a duty to share the “shame and sinfulness of his predecessors,” Williams said.

At the same meeting, the assembly approved a proposal by the archbishop calling for “further exploration” of a plan that would allow women to be ordained bishops, potentially as soon as 2012.

Advertisement

Radio Host Apologizes for Hajj Stampede Joke

Bill Handel, a morning radio talk-show personality with KFI-AM (640), has apologized to his Islamic listeners for parodying January’s hajj stampede that killed about 350 pilgrims traveling to Mecca. It was the second time in two years that he has asked their forgiveness.

“The wound was very fresh for a lot of Muslims, and the comments were out of line,” Handel said on his show last week, about a month after the skit aired. “And for that, I am sorry.”

Handel first begged pardon from his Islamic listeners in March 2004, when one of his sketches suggested that Iraqis wanted to kill Jews, marry camels, avoid bathing and meet Japanese schoolgirls in heaven.

“We had hoped we’d never have to go down this street again,” said Sabiha Khan, Los Angeles spokeswoman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “If we continue to say it’s OK to say derogatory things on radio and TV, it only dehumanizes people and makes it OK for others to go a step further.”

Regardless, KFI marketing director Neil Saavedra said Handel’s goal remains the same: to satirize the absurd. “We employ big personalities with big opinions,” he said.

“We can’t fire them for offending people; you’re always going to offend someone.”

Just this week, the council, with help from Islamic groups across the U.S., launched a nationwide campaign to educate people on the prophet Muhammad.

Advertisement

The council’s Southern California chapter kicked off its local effort in Anaheim.

Advertisement