100 YEARS

Along with Long Beach, Pomona, Compton and other Southern California cities celebrating their centennials this year, many churches are marking 100 years since their founding. Many churches also hit the century mark last year, and even more will next year. Get the picture?

Methodists were busy in 1888 establishing a dozen congregations that still are around today, including the First United Methodist Church of Whittier. That church closed one building in its complex after the Oct. 1 earthquake, but it suffered no apparent new damage in Thursday’s temblor. Wesley United Methodist Church in South-Central Los Angeles, known as the “mother church” of black United Methodism on the West Coast, is also 100 years old.

St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, at 12th and Los Angeles streets in Los Angeles, hopes to celebrate its centennial this summer with finally completed work on its new church building. It suffered a disastrous fire in 1983.

Episcopal parishes in the cities of Ventura, San Bernardino and Orange, and affiliates of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Glendora and Hollywood also have 100th anniversary celebrations this year. So does Rivera Baptist Church in Pico Rivera, aligned with the American Baptist churches.

For its centennial year, Immanuel Presbyterian Church in Los Angeles’ Wilshire District has a new pastor--the Rev. Gary A. Wilburn, who just completed 10 years on the staff at Bel Air Presbyterian Church.

A church started by Swedish-Americans 100 years ago in Los Angeles, Angelica Lutheran Church, culminates its celebration Sunday in a 10:30 a.m. service. There are still some members with Swedish ancestry, but at present the facilities are shared by five congregations: Spanish-, English- and Finnish-speaking Lutheran groups, a Korean Presbyterian body and a Guatemalan Indian K’anjobal group.

The rule of thumb of large metropolitan newspapers to ignore church anniversary stories was just violated for the last time, at least for quite a while.

PEOPLE

The Rev. J. Roger Anderson of Thousand Oaks will be formally installed today as the new bishop of the Los Angeles-based Southern California (West) Synod of the newly formed Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The denomination’s presiding bishop, Herbert W. Chilstrom of Chicago, will preach at the 1:30 p.m. service to be held at First Congregational Church in Pasadena. Anderson heads a synod of 165 congregations in the counties of Los Angeles, Ventura, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara and Kern. Anderson, elected to the post last year, recently added his name to an open letter to U.S. Senate members by the Religious Leaders Network, a group that includes Catholic Archbishop Roger M. Mahony and Methodist Bishop Jack Tuell, urging ratification of the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty between the United States and the Soviet Union.

HOLIDAY

The reflective Lenten period preceding Easter will begin Wednesday for Western Christendom. Roman Catholic parishes often add extra services during Ash Wednesday, especially in areas with a concentration of Latino worshipers. Easter will fall on April 3 for Western churches. Eastern Orthodox churches will begin Lent on Monday, Feb. 22, and celebrate Easter on April 10.

DATES

The 11th Angel Awards ceremony, honoring inspirational or moral-content mass media productions, will honor Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, Joe Barbera and William Hanna, and Burl Ives, among others, Tuesday night at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel. The sponsoring organization is Excellence in Media, once known as Religion in Media.