West Coast’s ‘Spiritual Style’ Described

Sociologists are being challenged by a “distinctive West Coast spiritual style” that churns out new religious movements that defy normal classifications of faith, says a UC Santa Barbara scholar.

It is a “spectacular dance of ever-changing movements and shifting partners,” wrote Wade Clark Roof, president of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, in the academic group’s current journal.

Nationwide surveys usually show West Coast residents as among the least frequent churchgoers and least convinced of traditional beliefs, prompting most analysts to see the region as relatively secular, said Roof.

But “the Pacific Rim marches to a different drumbeat from the rest of North America” and is “not necessarily less religious,” said the Santa Barbara religious studies professor.

“Because of the region’s diversity of religions, the frontier psychology, its great individualism, this part of the country has never had a religious establishment,” Roof wrote.

Almost a third of Catholics and Protestants in California said they believed in reincarnation in a 1988 survey that Roof conducted with a colleague.

“The West Coast’s heritage lends itself to the playful through cultivation of an inner life through concentration and contemplation, in its quests for the divine, in its belief in spiritual growth, and in its dialogue between Western and Eastern religious themes,” Roof said.

Immigration has made a big difference. Since the 1965 passage of the liberalizing Immigration and Nationality Act, about 20 million immigrants--mostly from Asia, Mexico and South America--have entered the United States, he said.

On the Pacific Rim, “we encounter a spirituality generally that is less institutionally contained and more eclectic in belief and practice,” he said.

“Consider the fact that so many Asians have become Christian and so many Latinos have become Protestant,” said Roof.

Such influences are found elsewhere in the country. Yet, he said, “West Coast entrepreneurs are second to none at popularizing and commodifying spirituality.”

PEOPLE

The Rev. Paul C. Risser, who has been pastor of a Santa Fe Springs church for 26 years, has been elected president of the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel, the Los Angeles-based denomination founded in 1927 by evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson.

While pastor of the 1,500-member Florence Avenue Foursquare Church, Risser periodically served on the 2.2-million-member denomination’s board of directors, and he currently chairs the Foursquare Mission Council. Risser was elected by delegates to a four-year term over the Rev. Glenn Burris Jr. of Charlotte, N.C., at last week’s annual convention.

ENVIRONMENT

An interfaith candlelight prayer vigil--focused on healing for cities and protection for national forests--will be held from 7 to 8:15 p.m. Sunday on the steps of the Pasadena Presbyterian Church on Colorado Boulevard. The sponsors range from the Sierra Club and Greater LA Cleanup to the John Muir Project. (626) 792-0109.

* Wyland, a California artist known for his whale-themed murals, will mark the “International Year of the Ocean” at the Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove on Sunday by creating an original work during the 9:30 a.m. and 11 a.m. services. He will be interviewed by the Rev. Robert H. Schuller during those services. (714) 971-4069.

* Composer-musician Jim Scott will present “Music for the Healing of the Planet” next weekend at Immanuel Presbyterian Church, 3300 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles. A creativity workshop next Saturday starts at 1 p.m. Scott will perform with a chorus and instrumental ensemble at 7:30 p.m. that night. Fees are $15 for the first event, $10 for the second. He will take part in a “church service of planetary celebration” at 11 a.m. May 3. (213) 389-3191, Ext. 105.

MUSIC

The Los Angeles Master Chorale will perform with organist Frederick Swann, directed by Paul Salamunovich, at 3 p.m. Sunday at Pasadena First United Methodist Church, 500 E. Colorado Blvd. $25 and $15. (213) 365-3500.

* Handel’s “Messiah,” parts II and III, will be performed by All Saints’ Episcopal Church choir and soloists, featuring the Musica Angelica Baroque Orchestra, at 5 p.m. Sunday at the church on Santa Monica Boulevard.

* Scottish music and dance will be performed Friday and next Saturday at Holy Trinity Episcopal Church, 100 N. 3rd Ave., Covina. The program, at 6 p.m. both days, is a fund-raiser to replace a damaged roof. $12.50. (626) 967-3939.

DATES

Former U.S. Secretary of Education William Bennett, author of “The Book of Virtues” and “Our Sacred Honor,” will deliver the keynote speech Wednesday night at a fund-raising dinner for the new campus of Mary Star of the Sea Catholic High School in San Pedro. The dinner at the Long Beach Hilton will raise money toward new high school buildings on surplus land acquired from the Navy. Invitations are $100 and $150. (310) 833-3861.

* More than 4,000 members of Churches of Christ are expected to attend the four-day Pepperdine University Bible Lectures on the Malibu campus next week. The 55th annual conference of lectures and classes will begin Tuesday at 7 p.m. in the Firestone Fieldhouse with a keynote talk by Tim Woodruff of Searcy, Ark. (310) 456-4270.

* Getting a jump on the May 7 National Day of Prayer, the Newport Mesa Irvine Interfaith Council will hold a prayer breakfast Friday at the Balboa Bay Club in Newport Beach, featuring Hugh Hewitt as the main speaker. Hewitt is co-host of KCET’s “Life & Times” program and hosted the PBS series “Searching for God in America.” $15. (714) 548-4942, Ext. 3.

* On the sixth anniversary of the Los Angeles riots, biblical scholar Cain Hope Felder of the Howard University School of Divinity will lead a free seminar next Saturday in Ladera Heights. Titled “Beyond Racial Tolerance,” the seminar will be from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at Knox Presbyterian Church, 5840 La Tijera Blvd., which is sponsoring the workshop with the Westminster and Brentwood Presbyterian churches. (213) 292-0654.

* A Jewish-Christian-Muslim dialogue, with the first of four Wednesday night discussions next week in Westwood, will feature Muzammil Siddiqi of Garden Grove, president of the Islamic Society of North America; Rabbi Elliot Dorff, rector of Los Angeles’ University of Judaism; and the Rev. George Grose, president of the Academy for Judaic, Christian and Islamic Studies at UCLA. $25. The 7:30 p.m. sessions will be at Westwood United Methodist Church. (310) 474-4511.

FINALLY

For challenging, albeit unsuccessfully, the requirement that Boy Scouts affirm a belief in God, the American Humanist Assn. will honor twins Michael and William Randall of Anaheim Hills with the Humanist Pioneer Award at the organization’s national convention next weekend in San Diego.

The California Supreme Court ruled last month that the Boy Scouts of America is a “social organization” that could require belief in a supreme being and expel the boys.

The 16-year-old brothers, who were close to becoming Eagle Scouts, said that they were not atheists but were undecided on their religious beliefs.

The New York-based American Humanists, who will open their three-day, 57th annual convention Friday at the Hanalei Hotel, will present the award to the twins and their parents.

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MISSION STATEMENT

The blandness and generalities of corporate and organizational mission statements tend to invite yawns or Dilbert-type sarcasm.

Thus, the Diocesan Council of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles asked Bishop Frederick Borsch, an accomplished writer, if he would polish the diocese’s new mission statement in a way to “make it sing.”

Borsch returned the 66-word mission statement with a shortened version in the form of a prayer and another rendition written as a hymn. It begins:

“One in prayer and in our worship/ called to justice, love and peace,/the disciples of Lord Jesus/we would serve God without cease./Come, Holy Spirit, come.”

Sung to the tune of the hymn “Like the Murmur of a Dove’s Song,” the musical version should be tried in liturgical celebrations, the Diocesan Council suggested.