Center for Spiritual Living celebrates 60 years

The La Crescenta Center for Spiritual Living, formerly known as La Crescenta Church of Religious Science, will celebrate its 60th anniversary this weekend.

It was Dec. 8, 1948, and the Chaffee family was considering expanding their study space, as their space in the La Crescenta Woman’s Club was getting too small. (They had been meeting there since their first public meeting in 1947.) So, a group of families — the Chaffees, the Shinkles, along with Charles Collum, Frank Thomson and William Wilkie — signed off on a plan that day to expand their space, and the Religious Science of Mind of Crescenta Valley was born. The Chaffees, Collums and Shinkles purchased land on Dunsmore Avenue which, at the time, had nothing but a dirt road running through it.

A year later on Aug. 14, 1949, a groundbreaking ceremony for the new 1,500-square-foot church, then called the Crescenta Valley First Chapter of Religious Science, was held. The church’s first pastor, the Dr. Sally Chaffee, turned the first shovelfuls of earth to mark the beginning of the construction of the new church. Chaffee, along with husband the Rev. Clifford Chaffee, provided leadership in the founding years.

The church was occupied in October of that year. Ernest Holmes, the founder of religious science in Los Angeles, was present at the church’s dedication on June 18, 1950.

The Crescenta Valley’s first religious science church began in the La Crescenta Woman’s Club in 1947, under the direction of Chaffee, who at the time was a ministerial intern, according to La Crescenta Center for Spiritual Living Senior Minister Rev. Beverly G. Craig.

“We’ve seen a lot of churches in the area, and it’s a real privilege to be here,” said ministerial intern Steve Van Meter, RScP. “We stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us.”

Ministerial intern Karen Morse feels the people responsible for the founding of the church wanted people to come and have a change in their life.

“So they [the Chaffees, Collums and Shinkles] paid for it, and then they built the church and dedicated it, knowing that they would have a lot of people come and receive the word of God and find tools for their life, so they could move forward in their life,” said Morse.

Part of the science of mind, part of the foundation of what the church teaches, is “looking at discordant thought in the face and know the truth about the individual,” said Van Meter.

“It’s really knowing that no matter what somebody is walking through, that there is something going on spiritually,” Van Meter added.

“When a person comes to us and they’re all panicky, we know the spiritual truth about that situation; we know that the highest and best is always happening,” said Craig. “When we can move them out of that space of fear — because fear is a powerful attractor — then the whole situation can change.”

“They think they’re broken toys, and they walk away knowing that they’re spiritual fed, they’re spiritual warriors,” said Morse, who taught Foundation classes at the church.

For more information about the church, its events and classes offered, call (818) 249-1045, e-mail lccrs@earthlink.net or visit www.lccrs.org.

michael.arvizu@latimes.com (818) 790-8774, ext. 17