Heavenly bells leave her feeling all rung out

The L.A. Archdiocese was at it again. After a desperate plea from a Times reader, I hit the road and headed to Cypress Park on a mission of mercy.

“Please, please, help me, Stop Those Bullhorns!!!” wrote Susan Rocha, who lives half a block from Divine Saviour church and has had it with the electronic chimes that blast through the neighborhood six times daily, beginning at 7:55 a.m.

Rocha, who manages an insurance office in Van Nuys and lives with her husband and two sons, has tried everything to get the volume turned down.

Since the bells were fixed last April after a seven-year silence, she and her son Danny, 20, have called Councilman Ed Reyes, Councilman Bernard C. Parks, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Supervisor Gloria Molina, City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo, the Police Commission, state Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer, U.S. Rep. Xavier Becerra and the Los Angeles Police Department.

Reyes spokesman Tony Perez told me churches are exempt from the city noise ordinance. Even if they weren’t, three agencies have visited the church and determined the decibel level was under allowable limits.

But that doesn’t calm Susan Rocha’s frazzled nerves. “I am tired” of “hearing that ding, dong, ding, dong all day,” she wrote to The Times.

I pulled up to Divine Saviour a little before 5 p.m. on Monday, peeked into the chapel and then found Father Marco Ortiz in the office. “We celebrate 100 years this year,” Ortiz said, telling me the first building, replaced in 1964, served Polish immigrants, followed by a wave of Italians and later Latinos.

Nice story. But what about the racket from those bells?

When the new ones first chimed a year ago, Ortiz said, “It was a great event” in the community. He said he had fielded only one complaint.

A likely story. I decided to poll the neighborhood.

“The bells are beautiful,” said Juan Torres, who lives across the street and was on his way to a church event with his wife and daughter.

They agreed, saying they were happy to have the bells back, serving as a community clock.

Nina Bonilla, 82, was dusting her 1984 Ford LTD -- “it runs BEE-YOO-tiful” -- and told me the church was a social center and anchor in the neighborhood, steering kids out of gangs and helping struggling families.

And the bells?

“BEE-YOO-tiful,” Bonilla said. If anyone disturbs the peace, she said, it’s Susan Rocha, who often stands on the corner yelling “ding-dong” in protest.

It was a bright, sunny day, with flowers blooming and spring in the air, and at 6 o’clock sharp, the bells chimed.

“This IS bee-yoo-tiful,” I told Bonilla, and I wasn’t just saying that for the sake of working my way out of the eternal fires and into purgatory.

I swear on the crypt that Cardinal Roger Mahony has reserved for me that the Divine Saviour’s bells are a blessing from on high.

“Not if you live here,” said Danny Rocha, who had come out of his house with his father. He called the bells insane, and said others agree but are terrified of speaking out for fear of going to hell.

Within a few minutes Susan Rocha was home, too, showing me the corner where she yells “ding-dong, ding-dong.”

I’m with the church on this one, I told the Rochas. Those bells toll for me, and as for thee, you could end up on a jury if Susan Rocha decides to take up her last option and sue. But should she? You can listen to the chimes and cast a vote atlatimes.com/churchbells

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steve.lopez@latimes.com