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“The Founding & Early Years of Pacific Unitarian Church”

January 22, 2017

This morning I want to pick up where I left off on November 16—outlining what I’ve discovered about the history of this congregation. I enjoy history and historical research and I’ve had a lot of fun going through the church archives in the PUC Library and talking with some of our long-time members. This is part of an effort on my part to help the congregation address and complete the First Developmental Task of interim ministry: understanding yourheritage and coming to appreciate both the high and the low points. This effort is designed to help you get clear about your current identity. The survey recently compiled by the Search Committee will also contribute to helping you more fully understand and collectively embrace your continuing mission in southwest Los Angeles County.

Pacific Unitarian Church was established sixty years ago. As I mentioned on my November 16, the mid-‘50s were a period of growing Cold War tension often enflamed by McCarthyism and other red-baiting behavior. Despite the threats to critical thinking, there were many people in the area eager for a liberal religious home. As outlined earlier, a California law required all religious institutions to sign a loyalty oath…or do without the standard tax-exemption. This delayed the official incorporation, but once the law was repealed things happened very fast. Immediately several strands came together or (as they say in New England) were formally “gathered”. These included a group disillusioned Manhattan Beach Congregationalists, a group from Palos Verdes and the Hollywood Riviera, and members of a foreign policy study group. Among them was Dr. Harry Shuder, a retired Army colonel, former Director of Education for the California Prisons, retired minister, systems analyst, and philosopher. Dr. Shuder—whose bust is in our library—agreed to work free of charge helping get the group up and organized. New people were specifically targeted with personal invitations and with ads in the local paper. And on St. Patrick’s Day, 1957 our church was born in the Walteria Park recreation building in Torrance [off W 242nd St., three blocks west of Hawthorne Blvd.]With very few exceptions, PUC has held weekly services ever since. The first Sunday school session was held five weeks later on Easter Sunday, 1957.

Reverend Shuder left after one year and was succeeded by Reverend William Seebode. Mr. Seebode had come from one of our oldest Unitarian churches back East: Old Ship in Hingham, Massachusetts, established (i.e., “gathered”) in 1635. But William Seebode was no strait-laced Puritan and under his leadership the congregation continued to thrive. He was active locally and denominationally and worked well with PUC’s first Religious Education Director, Ruth Hiehle. Rev. Seebode was also credentialed as a counselor.After five years he left parish ministry for full-time counseling.

Throughout these years PUC moved around. A lot. From Walteria Parkthey moved to the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Torrance, back to the park when the Adventists invited us to leave, and then for several years at the Miraleste Middle School [off Palos Verdes Dr. East] in Rancho Palos Verdes. They had many members, a burgeoning Sunday school, and—thanks to the generosity of members—a piece of property at 235th and Cabrillo Ave. in Torrance.

In 1963 PUC called their third Minister, Rev. Al Henriksen. He had served Unitarian Universalistchurches (the Unitarians having by now merged with the Universalists forming the UUA) in New England, Iowa, and Texas. Al’s was the longest ministry in PUC’s history: twenty-four years. He was a hard worker, comfortable in a focused meeting, socializing at coffee hour, or speaking for PUC and Unitarian Universalist values across the community. This past week I visited with Al to wish him a happy 95th birthday and he’s still much the same. Al Henriksen did a lot to connect PUC to Unitarian Universalism, especially deBenneville Pines, the UU camp in the San Bernardino Mountains where hundreds of our fellow congregants have, over the years, found rest, renewal, and lots of fun. Throughout his ministry, Al’s first wife, Ruth, a very excellent and ever steadfast volunteer, also served the church.

Probably the most impressive accomplishment of that period was building the church. There was considerable disagreement from the very beginning. Some members left when the Torrance site was sold and the Palos Verdes site purchased, fearing the congregation would become “a Palos Verdes rich people’s church.” There was much disagreement about the placement of the kitchen, too, “so far away from the auditorium.” But by 1965 the building was up and occupied. It took a long time to pay off the mortgage, but you accomplished that, too.

Disagreements, one suspects, are always part of church life, especially congregations as democratically organized as UU groups tend to be. Over the decades you guys have fought over

  • The name: it wasn’t until 1958 that “society” was dropped;
  • In 1957 a letter by the Board to President Eisenhower commending his decision to send federal marshals into Little Rock in support of school integration brought forth praise and protests from among the members;
  • Dissention about liturgical forms: should it be called “worship?” Were responsive readings OK? Should we have a church choir?

The 1970s were pretty free form everywhere in California and UU churches, though not the vanguard, weren’t all that far behind. It was a period of openness and experimentation, of church-sponsored singles groups and lots of energy in support of Esalen-like “encounter groups” and similar inner growth programs allied withthe Human Potential Movement. And PUC was right there. Like many at the time, Rev. Henriksen supported these cultural vectors, including open marriage. In time these dynamics, exacerbated by private issues between various groups escalated to the point where a meeting was called to vote on dismissing the minister. As it turned out, Al Henriksen survived and the church survived. Some people resigned. The ethos of the congregation changed with the times, and increased awareness of the social and emotional costs—the spiritual costs— that can accompany weak or too permeable boundaries. As it turned out, PUC emerged stronger than ever. Reverend Henriksen stayed for many more years andtensions were healed.

There seems to be a reconciling energy here that keeps this place vital, it seems to me. And it’s a holy thing, this willingness among the core membership to go ahead and have disagreements, all right, but not to allow disagreement to become what you’re all about and to take over. Again and again you’ve chosen forbearance. An ethos of reconciliation. And also of stepping up. Letting disagreements go—heartfelt ones some of them, for sure. Forgiving one another.And, remembering one’s own uncharitableness from time to time,forgiving ourselves. And starting fresh with the immediate matters at hand: providing a place where freedom of worship, speech, and thought are fostered and protected, and a pulpit where these freedoms are celebrated and nurturing physical, moral, and spiritual growth in church and the community-at-large.[*]Yes! There seems to be a reconciling spirit here, whereby you’ve weathered controversy and somehow become stronger in the process.

Several fine Religious Education Directors have served PUC. And the program has gone through its ups and downs. It’s been smaller than it is now, and, believe it or not, much larger. There was a time (during PUC’sfirst decade, when social pressure had just about everyone joining a religious community of some kind)when PUC’s Religious EducationProgram had over 400 registrants from the babies through high school. And these were pretty good classes, too, with good Sunday school teachers. It takes a while to get a strong program rolling, but the key ingredient—in my mind—is a strong, warm-hearted RE Director who cares about the program and the families it serves. And that you clearly have in Claire Moss.

From its earliest days here, the congregation has sponsored many programs of cultural and artistic value:

  • Alan Watts, Virginia Satir, Jane Fonda
  • Concerts, film series, dances
  • Art exhibits, including work deemed too controversial for mainstream galleries.

A play on the patio preformed by a group of Black artist-activists included the brandishing and firing of blank guns. Alarmed neighbors across the canyon called the Sheriff, who, by merely showing up, quickly quelled the make-believe mayhem.

Political theater was onlyone of many ways the church has drawn attention over the years to threatened human rights.Liberal ideals and ideas have been under threat from time to time, and are not always popular. Nevertheless, members of this church were very active in support of fair housing, including contributing social and financial support to families of color moving into segregated neighborhoods. I read in one of Betty Paieda’s wonderful reports[†] that the church officially boycotted grapes for ten years. More courageously—and worth remembering in the current era—Pacific Unitarian Church has a strong tradition of sponsoring and supporting refugees: from Yugoslavia (in the ‘60s), Cambodia (in the ‘70s), and El Salvador (in the 1990’s).The church became an official UUA Welcoming Congregation, supporting LGBTQ rights as human right: especially the right tolove—and to marry—whomever one wants.

So…. This place has been a place of free inquiry, open dialogue, and public witness. But it has also been a place of good parties and get-togethers over the years. Dancing, skits, and dinners together, beach parties and hundreds of other formal and informal gatherings that were fun, and that included interesting and accomplished people. One highly successful program, known as Extended Families, involved dozens upon dozens of folks. People bonded across generations and across town. And relationships were made that have lasted ever since.

You’ve had three settled ministries since Rev. Henriksen retired in the late 1980s. I’ll take them up later this spring when I conclude this sermon series by asking, “Who is PUC today? But this much I can say now: you’re an impressive group with a notable history and a bright future. May it always be so. Amen.

Reverend Dr. Stephen H. Furrer, Interim Minister / Pacific Unitarian Church

5621 Montemalaga Drive, Rancho Palos Verdes, California 90275

[*]The current bylaws PUC Statement of Purpose (bylaws Article 3, updated 2011) reads: As a member congregation of the UUA, PUC subscribes to the principles of the Unitarian Universalist faith. The central aspiration of PUC is the creation of a Unitarian Universalist community in which these principles are honored, encouraged and practiced by each of its members, and which serves as an example for our neighbors and other congregations within our denomination. To this end, PUC

  • promotes the freedom of thought, freedom of speech and freedom of worship of its members;
  • maintains a pulpit where such freedoms are exercised and made manifest to the congregation and larger community;
  • encourages and supports its members in their own free and responsible search for truth and meaning in their lives;
  • welcomes the participation of its members, friends and visitors in church activities, programs, and services with the same unconstrained policy indicated for membership in section 4.2 and
  • strives to be conscious of, and serve the needs of, its members and of the larger community.

[†]PUC: Twenty-five years of fellowship