Lagunans Speak of Healing, Give Thanks in Churches

Surrounded by the stark images of last week’s fire--charred hillsides and the lingering smell of smoke--Laguna Beach residents flocked to the city’s churches Sunday for solace and inspiration.

At St. Paul’s Lutheran Church on a hillside in Bluebird Canyon, the Rev. Richard G. Schumm told the large gathering that they would hear “a service of thanksgiving like we have never had.”

“We are charged with emotion. Many people are hurting,” Schumm said. “Let’s sing out.”

Larger than usual Sunday crowds listened as ministers spoke of God’s will, of a time of crisis and suffering, of rebuilding their homes and lives with God as a foundation. Many parishioners brought along food and clothing to donate to the 350 local families who lost their homes in Wednesday’s fire.

But before the Sunday sermons were spoken, at least two local ministers offered members of the audience the rare opportunity to deliver their own messages. People in the pews--some members of the congregations, others simply visitors--stood up at their seats and spoke to the others, some offering their feelings of grief, others giving thanks.

The listeners cried, and cheered, and applauded.

“What I have on today is what I have,” Betty Hillman, a member of the choir, said to the large gathering at the stately, downtown Laguna Presbyterian Church. Her home was destroyed in the fire, but she said the disaster has showed her that the more important possessions are “the love of friends, family and complete strangers.”

At St. Paul’s, the church’s former pastor, the Rev. Roy G. Gesch, who lost his home and all his belongings, stood up and told the crowd: “We have never seen so much love.”

Speaking for his wife, Dorothy, Gesch said: “We hit a low spot. There never has been a lower spot in our lives. But this is a time for healing and the healing has already started.”

The fire and the rebuilding spirit became the rallying point for sermons all over town. At St. Paul’s, Schumm said thanksgiving was appropriate despite all the devastation in the city.

“Because there was not a single loss of life,” he answered. “That’s a story of amazing grace. To find my church, and your church, standing here. You cannot even find a singed piece of grass in our neighborhood.”

The Rev. Jerry Tankersley told the packed crowd at Laguna Presbyterian Church that recent events showed what it means to be “poor in spirit.”

“You recognize you are helpless. You recognize you are powerless, that you are not in ultimate control of your life,” Tankersley said. “The forces of nature were overwhelming. But Jesus says, in that moment people are able to surrender their lives.”

Laguna Beach will never be the same, Tankersley said, because “in some senses we have lost our innocence.”

“Because we know that what has happened in India, South Africa, Mexico . . . can happen here in Laguna Beach,” Tankersley said.

Bad times such as the past week can be full of opportunity, said Pastor Francis Dubau of the Calvary Chapel in Laguna Beach.

“My sense is that when things are going bad, I believe that God can accomplish great things,” Dubau said. “This has been a great opportunity for people to issue their love for one another.”

At Laguna Beach’s Hare Krishna Temple, President Baba Haridas said his afternoon service would attempt to show that difficult times bring people closer to God.

“There is nothing we can hang onto forever,” he said. “Think of our houses and homes, when everything is taken away the only thing left is our love for God.”

The Rev. Bill Krekelberg of St. Catherine’s Catholic Church said he has identified 25 parishioners who have lost their homes in the fire. He called his greatest current effort “finding out who is in need.”

“The tragedy is kind of a growing thing,” he said before the services. “I don’t ever want to go through anything like this again. But it’s here and it’s part of God’s providence so we have to get through it.”

At the First Church of Christian Science in Boat Canyon, where the fire was halted only three-quarters of a mile away, members remarked that they had not seen so many people in church since the Gulf War.

“It’s doubled,” Judith Ronaky, the church’s clerk, said about the attendance. “We’re particularly blessed because we have congregants who live in upper Emerald Bay, and one in Morro Beach, and they were spared.”

Of the estimated 300 who attended services Sunday morning, none lost their homes, Ronaky said.

“There’s a kind of humility,” she said. “You’re just kind of awe- struck and it makes you humble.”

Times staff writer David Reyes contributed to this report.