TEMPLE-BEAUDRY : Church Faithful Vow to Save Building

Six months ago, life began seeping back into the abandoned little yellow church at Colton Street and Beaudry Avenue.

Determined to save Our Lady of the Holy Rosary Mission, a group of former congregation members banded together to make sure the neighborhood did not lose its 70-year-old historic and spiritual cornerstone, which the Archdiocese of Los Angeles sold to the Los Angeles Unified School District in 1993 to make way for a new middle school.

With their own money, the members rented the empty building from the school district and turned it into a community center, bringing in English classes and children’s activities. Their aim was to convince city officials that the former church was still too valuable to the community to demolish, and should be moved to a new site instead.

Their efforts continue, with a new twist: the El Rosario Community Center, as it became known last fall, has now become the home of a new community theater.

Last weekend, Teatro Del Centro hosted its first performance before an audience of more than 200, the largest crowd to enter the former church since its last Sunday Mass almost two years ago.

Student actors from Fresno State’s Teatro TORTILLA (El Teatro of Raza Towards Involvement of Local Latino Awareness) performed “La Victima,” a play spanning several generations in the life of a Mexican immigrant family, on a stage built onto what was once the altar.

As she waited to catch a glimpse of the play during an afternoon dress rehearsal, Luisa Vela explained why her group, the Committee to Save Our Lady of the Holy Rosary Mission, decided to add theater to its community offerings.

“It’s a faster way to let the city and other people know that we are important,” said Vela, the committee’s secretary, who raised her children down the street from the church but moved to Santa Monica when developers began razing the neighborhood in the late 1970s for projects that were never built.

“We’re trying to give the community what the priests here used to give it: guidance, family values and spiritual food,” she said. “We believe that even though this is no longer a mission, as a theater it can still give the community that.”

The group is putting together a proposal outlining activities at the center to give to Councilman Mike Hernandez’s office in hopes the city will donate a new site for the church, which has already been moved twice to make way for construction over the years.

“We’re open to helping,” said Jose Gardea, a senior field deputy for Hernandez. “We could help them find funding or find land. It’s all really based on what the proposal says, so we want to see something formal as to what they want to do.”

The group’s proposal is still in the works as they define their theater program. Max Terronez, an audience coordinator for television shows and former Fresno State student who enlisted the Teatro TORTILLA players, has taken responsibility for the development of Teatro Del Centro.

Through contacts he has made in television and theater, he hopes to put together theater workshops for local youths as an alternative to the powerful lure of gangs.

“Belmont High has no theater department, so we want to bring in workshops for local kids,” he said. “Politicians won’t get involved with us unless we have something going. If this is successful, it will give us more leverage for land donations so we can move.”

If negotiations with the city do not yield results, the group will try to convince someone in the community to donate land. They also will need to come up with an estimated $40,000 to move the building.

So far, fund-raisers have only yielded enough to augment the small donations that help committee members pay the $800 monthly rent.

Ticket sales from upcoming performances--including a Latino comedy show on Thursday--will go toward the potential move, Terronez said, but it is clear they will still need outside help.

If the committee does find a new site, it must first purchase the building from the school district in an auction this summer before they can relocate it, Vela said.

Despite their desire to save the former church, committee members and other local residents know that it is a race against time. Demolition is slated to begin in the fall.

At the conclusion of last weekend’s play, neighbor Mauricia Miranda, who has lived nearby for 32 years, rose from her seat to clap and cheer.

“I don’t know how long they’ll be able to preserve this,” she said. “But even if they can’t preserve it for a long time, so long as it exists, they are making it something positive.”

Teatro Del Centro information: (213) 481-1634.