Quiet Campus Busy Training Army for God

On a serene slope of the Palos Verdes Peninsula an army is at work, training officers for a mission from God.

This force--whose only sword is the Scriptures--is the Salvation Army, which moved its 13-state Western region’s training school and administrative offices here from San Francisco in 1975.

Located in Crestmont on the former grounds of Marymount Palos Verdes College, the two-year school serves as a sort of seminary-by-the-surf for the Lord’s soldiers.

“When we look at (our campus),” said Maj. Alfred Van Cleef, the assistant principal, “we look at what we consider a miracle and an answer to prayer--we really do.”

Indeed, the campus--which boasts a bird’s-eye view of Catalina Island from its bluff across from Marineland--is a far cry from the skid rows, disaster sites and shopping malls so commonly associated with the Salvation Army.

The Army paid more than $2 million for the property by selling its former Fillmore District headquarters and collecting special donations--not Christmas kettle funds--according to Van Cleef.

Enrollment Varies

During its first decade, attendance on the 34-acre campus has ebbed and flowed, with the class size now at a low mark of 56 cadets.

However, school officials predict a resurgence. And as for this year’s class--ranging in age from 19 to 42 and including former bank managers, Air Force officers and alcoholics--they appear as buoyant, well-scrubbed and devoted a group as one is likely to find.

“The (campus) is always a nice place to come back to,” said second-year student Jonnette Bowen, 22. “But not just the scenery and the beautiful site. It’s the people who make it . . . being all together as a big family.”

As with military trainees, Salvation Army cadets participate in a rigorous course of study and are then dispatched to wherever they are needed to serve the church.

Bowen, for example, will leave a week after her June ordainment for a post that could be in Wyoming, Hawaii or anywhere in between. She will not know until just before her departure whether she will serve in a ministerial position or as the administrator of an Army social service program, such as those for unwed mothers, the homeless or alcoholics.

“This is an unusual type setting in the fact that we technically have no personal goals,” said fellow second-year student Paul Fanning, 30. “The Salvation Army sends us wherever there’s a need throughout the Western region.”

Although the Army employs the trappings and terminology of battle--all officers wear midnight-blue epauleted uniforms and new members are required to accept a series of vows labeled “Articles of War”--the officers are hardly militaristic.

Bowen, for one, could probably melt the snow off the ground in her hometown of Fairbanks, Alaska, with her smile and cheerful demeanor.

Nor is the school like an ordinary college.

Where else, for example, are students required to scrub the walls and floors of the classroom buildings, or keep a daily schedule of 6:45 a.m. to 5 p.m., or spend weekends, summers and Christmas seasons in hands-on training in church, social and charity work across the Western states?

Even the courses are unusual. One recent morning, Capt. James Bradley devoted his business administration class to the topics of goal-setting and salvation. The only numbers discussed were those of Bible chapters such as Ephesians 5:15-16, which reads: “Live life then with a due sense of responsibility.”

To the Salvation Army, Bradley indicated, an officer’s accountability is chiefly to God--not to an accounting department.

Other courses in the school’s sparsely decorated classrooms range from the spiritual to the practical--including advanced Bible, Christmas field training (exploring the various aspects of caroling and kettling) and guitar lessons.

Not surprisingly, most Army cadets have mastered at least one band instrument. In fact, a married cadet couple, Leroy and Doreen Thieme, met while playing alto horns in the Phoenix Salvation Army band.

Students acknowledge that their decisions to attend the Peninsula school--thus devoting their lives to the church--were hardly spur-of-the-moment.

‘A Lot of Prayer’ “It took me a good four years to sort through things--a lot of prayer, questioning, talking to officers,” said Fanning, a Pasadena resident formerly employed by the Boy Scouts of America.

Students agree, too, that although the Salvation Army is universally recognized, some of their best friends and relatives do not fully understand the Army’s mission.

“Non-Salvation Army friends have no concept, no idea of the ministry of the Salvation Army,” Fanning said. “They basically think we’ll be driving blue trucks, picking up used clothing. They don’t understand that first and foremost the Salvation Army is a church for the salvation of the lost, to bring back into the fellowship of God people who have fallen away. I guess you’d call them sinners who do not have the knowledge of Christ.”

In all, the Army boasts about 125,000 church members in the United States, said Van Cleef, and about 3,500 active officers (the denomination’s version of ordained ministers). Founded more than 100 years ago by the Rev. William Booth--whose bywords were “Soup, Soap and Salvation”--the Army’s main headquarters remains in London, where the troops are watched over by Gen. Jarl Wahlstrom.

As well as tending to the needy--and seeking to convince them to adopt Jesus as their savior--the Salvation Army invests a great deal of time, money and energy in its officer candidates. The fee for the two-year training course is only $1,250, a fraction of its real cost.

About half of the Army’s carefully screened students are children of church members, Van Cleef said. And about half are married couples. In the Salvation Army, officers are not allowed to marry non-officers, so couples attend the school together.

Unlike some religious groups, the Army is open-minded about women recruits, with students including singles such as Bowen (who is engaged to marry another officer) and married women like Doreen Thieme, who lives in one of the campus’ two dorms with her husband, Leroy, and their 21-month-old son Aaron.

“Our women preach and pray and bury and perform all the ceremonies of our denomination,” said Van Cleef.

As a result of their 10-day spring evangelistic campaigns, five weeks of Christmas kettle work and 10-week summer service assignments, cadets are well prepared for Army life off the Peninsula when they graduate each June.

In Fanning’s words: “We learn a lot of flexibility, being able at a moment’s notice to drop everything to rely on prayer and ability to get along.”

Life at the training school isn’t exactly like that in Animal House.

Students lead a restrained existence, with the music from dorms more likely to be religious choirs than Bruce Springsteen. Cadets say they rarely venture off campus except for crusading or fund-raising missions.

“I haven’t been to the beach yet,” said Doreen Thieme.

The school, however, does offer at least one concession to South Bay life-style--the tranquil campus green sports a volleyball net.