Claremont School Makes Name Official

The official name has been the School of Theology at Claremont since the seminary moved to that city nearly 40 year ago. But many people often called it the Claremont School of Theology.

So be it. Administrators and board members of the 350-student seminary announced this week that they have formally changed the name to Claremont School of Theology.

“There are lots of schools of theology and there is only one Claremont,” said President Robert Edgar.

In the past, putting the words School of Theology first was intended to distinguish the seminary from the Claremont Colleges, the well-respected group of private, liberal arts colleges in the town.

But Edgar said the seminary now has a true connection to one school in the cluster, the Claremont Graduate School. “We didn’t have anything in writing before, but we now have clearly defined partnership with the Claremont Graduate School,” Edgar said.

“Fifteen of our seminary faculty teach at least one class at Claremont Graduate School and at least one at the School of Theology,” he said.

A graduate school of the United Methodist Church, the Claremont School of Theology began as the Maclay College of Theology in 1895 before moving to the USC campus, where it was named the School of Religion. The school relocated to Claremont in 1957, using Claremont Colleges space before moving onto its Foothill Boulevard campus in 1960.

Like Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, the Claremont School of Theology competes for students from a variety of denominational backgrounds.

One benefit of the name change, Edgar quipped, is that on lists of seminaries, “we have moved up in alphabetical order--ahead of Fuller.”

MEDIA

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The third annual City of Angels Film Festival, opening under the banner of “the search for meaning in films,” will begin Thursday night in Glendale with the 50th anniversary showing of “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

The 1946 film directed by Frank Capra will be shown at 7 p.m. at the Alex Theatre, 215 N. Brand Blvd., with Frank Capra Jr. and several members of the cast expected to attend. The festival will continue with screenings, often followed by panel discussions, for the next three days at the Directors Guild of America building, 7920 Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles.

Films include “The Player,” “Gates of Heaven,” “Apocalypse Now,” “Pinocchio” and “The Seventh Seal.” Also showing will be three student films chosen for the first Angelus Awards of Family Theater Productions, a co-sponsor of the film festival with Fuller Theological Seminary and Catholics in Media Associates. Admission price is $7.50 per showing. (818) 304-3775.

* Actor Gregory Peck, last year’s winner of the Catholics in Media Associates lifetime achievement award, will introduce this year’s recipient, actor Carroll O’Connor, during the organization’s annual awards brunch Oct. 27 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. O’Connor played Archie Bunker in the “All in the Family” sitcom and starred as a Southern sheriff in “Heat of the Night,” which ran seven seasons. Tickets: $45. (818) 907-2734.

DATES

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A symposium reflecting the social-spiritual work of Prabhat Rainjan Sarkar, the late founder of the Ananda Marga movement, will be held Oct. 19 at UCLA’s Ackerman Union around the theme of “bringing our collective spirit into the next millennium.” Speakers will include Robert Bly, whose book “Iron John” sparked a mens’ self-esteem movement; Ravi Batra of Southern Methodist University, author of “The Great Depression of 1990;” and Didi Ananda Mitra, an author and yoga teacher. The daylong symposium costs $85. Tickets: (310) 825-2101.

* Sixteen-year-old pianist Andrew von Oeyen of Malibu, who recently won top prize in the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Bronislaw Kaper Piano Competition, will join the Chamber Orchestra of St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church, 1031 Bienveneda Ave., Pacific Palisades, in an all-Beethoven concert at 7:30 p.m. Friday. The program launching the church’s 13th annual concert season will feature the pianist in Beethoven’s Third Concerto. Admission is $18. (310) 573-7787.

* Jim Wallis, editor of Sojourners magazine in Washington, will speak Tuesday at 3:30 p.m. in USC’s United University Church, inaugurating the first Father Lawrence Jenco lectureship series honoring the late priest who was held hostage by terrorists in Lebanon in the mid-1980s. Admission is free. (213) 740-2667.

* Joseph Webb, a former journalism teacher, religious radio producer and pastor, will speak on “Preaching and the Theology of Comedy” at 4:15 p.m. Tuesday in Mudd Theater at the Claremont School of Theology, where he is an associate professor of homiletics. The lecture is free.

* The Rev. Maake J. Masango, newly elected moderator of the Presbyterian Church of Southern Africa, will speak at 12:15 p.m. and 7 p.m. Friday at Lakewood First Presbyterian Church, 3955 Studebaker Road, Long Beach. (310) 420-3393.

* The Southwark Cathedral Choir from London will give a concert at 5 p.m. Sunday at All Saints’ Episcopal Church, 504 N. Camden Drive, Beverly Hills. Suggested donations are $10 and $15. (310) 275-2910.

* The “Not Even One” prevention program against childhood death and injury by firearms will be presented in a church-and-clergy-backed town hall meeting from 10 a.m. to noon Oct. 19 at Compton City Hall, 205 S. Willowbrook Ave., according to the Rev. Romie J. Lilly II, the program organizer. (310) 989-0332.

FINALLY

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Vietnamese-born clergy and lay leaders in non-Catholic churches, seeking to make friends across denominational lines and form a common mission strategy, will hold a four-day church development conference beginning Wednesday at the Garden Grove Friends Church, 12211 Magnolia St.

The Christian and Missionary Alliance, Mennonites, Southern Baptists and Assemblies of God started churches in South Vietnam before the fall of the Saigon government. Several other Protestant denominations have recently begun ministries among Vietnamese immigrants and hope to start churches in their Southeast Asian homeland.

With the improvement of relations between the United States and Vietnam and the latter government’s recent permission to publish Bibles and hymnals, the Vietnamese World Christian Fellowship, sponsors of the conference, said a common strategy is needed for evangelizing in Vietnam. “Religious and missionary activities in Vietnam are still restricted by the government,” said a fellowship spokesman.

Speakers at the meeting will include LeRoy Lawson, president of Pacific Christian College, Fullerton, and Isaac Canales of Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena.

The national conference also will address Vietnamese Christian concerns over new welfare and immigration laws that “reduce or eliminate many benefits which have been available to the disabled, elderly and mentally ill in the Indochinese community,” a spokesman said.

Notices may be mailed to Southern California File, c/o John Dart, L.A. Times, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth, CA 91311, or faxed to Religion desk (818) 772-3385. Items should arrive about three weeks before the event, except for spot news, and should include pertinent details about the people and organizations with address, phone number, date and time.

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PEOPLE

Approaching his 88th birthday and marking 50 years of making choir robes for churches and schools nationwide, Henri O’Bryant is bringing three noted African American educators to Los Angeles this weekend to outline plans for his new National Youth Business Academy, designed to train young people for business careers. The two-day, church-endorsed meeting, starting at 3 p.m. today, will be held at Marla Gibbs Vision Complex, 4310 Degnan Blvd. The three educators are Clarence G. Newsome, dean of Howard University’s School of Divinity in Washington; Talbert O. Shaw, president of Shaw University in Raleigh, N.C., and Samuel D. Jolley Jr., president of Morris Brown College in Atlanta.

* UCLA historian David N. Myers has been appointed director of UCLA’s Center for Jewish Studies, succeeding Arnold Band, a faculty member since 1959. Myers, who earned his doctorate at Columbia in 1991, is author of “Reinventing the Jewish Past: European Jewish Intellectuals and the Zionist Return to History” (Oxford, 1995). UCLA established an undergraduate major in Jewish studies in the early 1970s and now offers about three dozen courses in the field.

* Imam Warith Deen Mohammed of Chicago, the spiritual leader of the largest African American Muslim movement, met for the first time with Pope John Paul II last week at the Vatican in a private audience. Abdul Karim Hasan, the imam of Bilal Islamic Mosque in Los Angeles, was among four clergy who accompanied Mohammed and attended the preceding general papal audience Oct. 2. Mohammed will be in Los Angeles on Nov. 24 for a public talk on Islam in America at the Westin Bonaventure hotel. (213) 233-7274.