COMMUNITY BULLETIN BOARD
Sister Corita Comes to Hollywood
The Corita Art Center in Los Feliz is working with the Los Feliz Art Walk to present a major multi-venue exhibition and celebration beginning Friday, June 4 in observance of the 40th Anniversary of the Immaculate Heart Community in Los Feliz.
Watch this space and the Los Feliz Art Walk website for details:
Friday, June 4 — Los Feliz Art Walk Exhibition, Reception & live music at Courtyard Galleries, Panel Discussion at Skylight and multi-venue image scavenger hunt throughout several venues. At the Courtyard/Hollywood Lutheran: exhibit of Corita Kent's 40-foot long "Beatitudes" banner, and a live musical accompaniment by John August Swanson and his friends. Reception and exhibit of other graphics and serigraphs in the Courtyard Galleryand other spaces. A second edition of Corita's book is being released, with a panel discussion at Skylight Books on Vermont.
Tuesday, June 22 — A hand book-making workshop at the Los Feliz Library. Art ork produced in the worksghop to be exhibited at the September Art Walk.
Saturday, July 24— Silkscreening workshop at The Blue Rooster -- the results may be shown at the August Art Walk.
Sunday, August 15-- a three-activity art day as part of the First Annual North New Hampshire Avenue Block Party
The Prison and Parolee Outreach Committee is giving wings to a new ministry which will offer spiritual and tangible help to many people in California penal institutions. We correspond regularly with about 15 inmates, most of whom came to us by referral.Mariposa Ministry takes flight 
A new web page for the Mariposa Ministry has been added to this web site. You can also download the introductory brochure, "Good News for Inmates" (PDF 
version).
One former inmate is now in our area on parole (doing well and looking for work). We are expecting to help at least three more parolees in the next 12 months.
Out of tragedy, some good
Many area residents were horrifed to learn of the kidnapping and murder of a 17-year old Los Feliz girl, who was apparently forced to withdraw funds from an ATM machine and take cash advances from a credit card, before being murdered in July 2009. Her killer, who should have been in prison as a "three strikes" convict, was sentenced in May to life in prison without possibility of parole.
Because many teens in the Silverlake Children's Theatre Group knew Lily Burk personally, her tragic death became a galvanizing event. The Theatre Group's President and Artistic Director Broderick Miller sprang to action, and has called for a series of workshops on Personal Safety and Street Smarts especially for high school girls. (Boys are also welcome.) The first one will be held in Durkee Hall at Hollywood Lutheran Church on Thursday evening, September 17 at 7:00 p.m. The event is free.
S.L.A.A. meeting comes to Hollywood
HLC is now hosting a Sunday morning SLAA (Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous) 12-step meeting for at least two months. The group gathers in the Courtyard Gallery (Classrooms 3/4) at 8:30 a.m.
This SLAA meeting lost its regular meeting space at the Self-Realization Fellowship for at least two months because of curent remodelling work going on there. We are pleased to welcome this 12-Step meeting for as long as they need us.
Welcome to Kaiser/Barnsdall Farmers Market
In mid-summer 2009, at the request of Kaiser Permanente Medical Center - Los Angeles, Barnsdall Art Park opened its lengthy, landscaped street level parking lot to a new Farmers Market on Wednesdays, from 12:00 noon to 6:00 pm. Kaiser Permanente has been pushing its corporate vision for thrving with good health into the area of eating right, and numerous Kaiser facilities now make local farmers markets possible. Stop in, enjoy lunch, and pick up some fresh, premium produce, breads and other food products.
(There is still parking on the park roadway above the main parking lot, but you can also park at Hollywood Lutheran Church and walk the 1/2 block to Hollywood Blvd.!)
Space is still available to grow your own! The best time for planting cool-weather vegetables begins now, with harvests in November--February and beyond. There are still plots of good earth available to turn in the Hollywood Community Garden. Call the Church Office for details.
Yikes! Would you be willing to pay $40 a year just to look for a parking place on the street in front of your apartment? This could happen in your neighborhood: |  |
There is a movement afoot to establish a “Preferential Parking District” in our neighborhood, which would require residents to pay for an annual permit to park on the street. Supporters think it will keep out the “riff-raff.” But the local Neighborhood Council is opposed. What do you think?
Presently there are more than 100 such "PPD's" in Los Angeles, with another 95 applications in the pipeline. Often driven by homeowners groups, people believe that have a special permit district will keep outsiders outside, and therefore leave more parking for locals.
But this is not always the case, especially in neighborhoods which have a constantly-shifting range of housing options from large single-family homes to condominiums to cramped apartment buildings. The current effort, being proposed by Ms. Dana Cremins, would span from Los Feliz to Hollywood Blvd., and from Normandie to Vermont. Ms. Cremins believes that commercial encroachment deprives all residents of adequate street parking in the evenings and on weekends. But it is far from clear how many customers or patrons at the area's many stores, restaurants and clubs actually live outside of the designated area.
If you have ever gone shopping, dining, or to a movie in West Los Angeles, for example, you know how frustrating it is not to be able to park anywhere, and then wind up shelling out more for your parking than for your movie ticket.
Pastor Dan is rallying area pastors to speak out against the PPD, because it would adversely affect not only our own church members (although Sunday mornings are exempted) but every community organization which meets in our buildings throughout the week. A PPD would require our church to buy a 4-month permit for $15 for every car parked in the evening on New Hampshire or any surrounding street. We would then have to employ staff to give out (and get back!) those permits every night. And then drivers would still be competing to find an actual parking space!!
The Greater Griffith Park Neighborhood Council is on record as opposing PPD's because they tend to pit one group of residents against another --- contributing to the "balkanization" of neighborhoods in the city. And PPD's do not actually create any new parking spaces, nor do they require business owners to construct, buy or lease off-street parking for their patrons.
Knots or Not? (June 20, 2008)
Since the May 15 decision of the California Supreme Court, the phones have been ringing like wedding bells! Lesbian and gay couples who have seen our Hollywood Wedding web site, or visited "My Big Fat Gay Church Wedding" booth at the West Hollywood Christopher Street West Pride festival are thinking of "tying the knot" in a religious ceremony.
We are in a five month “window” during which lesbian and gay couples are able to legally marry. The Supreme Court's decision would have stood as the final decision were it not for a ballot initiative that is to be on the November 2008 ballot attempting to amend the state's constitution to forbid same-gender marriage and therefore reverse the Court's decision.
Whether this initative (largely funded by very conservative outside organizations in Arizona and Colorado) will get a majority vote remains to be seen. Mayor Vilaraigosa, Governor Schwarzeneggar and other leading organizations are opposed to Proposition 8, saying that it would take away basic civil rights essential to lesbian and gay couples to protect themselves and their families.
This congregation has welcomed gay/lesbian blessings before, most recently on March 30. Until June 17, however, these religious ceremonies had no binding force in the absence of a valid marriage license. But now that they are legal, couples are stepping forward hoping to sign a legal document and have a Christian service at the same time. Pastor Dan has about six such weddings "in the works" between now and the end of October. He also presided over one in West Hollywood on the first day they were allowed.
The congregation will have a meeting on Sunday, September 7 to discuss Proposition 8, and whether or not to endorse the efforts of Marriage Equality California, which is trying to defeat this measure. So that everyone understands the law, churches and other tax-exempt "501.c.3" organizations may legally take a position of ballot measures and matters of public policy. the only thing which we cannot do under IRS regulations is endorse a candidate for office.
SCREENING OF AWARD-WINNING FILM "FOR THE BIBLE TELLS ME SO"
This important documentary film was recently shown in a limited engagement in Westwood, and at St. Matthew's Lutheran Church in Burbank, but it should be seen by thousands more. We are trying to bring this film to Holywood Lutheran Church for a special screening.
Can the love between two people ever be an abomination? Is the chasm separating gays and lesbians and Christianity be too wide to cross? Is the Bible an escuse to hate?
Through the experiences of five very normal, very Christian, very American families--including those of former House Majority Leade Richard Gephardt and Episcopal Bishop Gene Robsinson-- we discover how insightful people of faith handle the realization of having a gay child. Informed by such respected voices as Bishop Desmond Tutu, Harvard University's Peter Gomes, Orthodox Rabbi Steven Greenberg and Rev. Jimmy Creech,
For the Bible Tells Me So offers healing, clarity, and udnerstanding to anyone caught in the crosshairs of scripture and sexual identity.
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