1. New beginnings for split Crystal Cathedral flocks

By Tori Richards

(Reuters) – After taking a breakaway congregation out of Crystal Cathedral, a daughter of the retired televangelist who built the faltering California mega-church led services on Sunday at a movie theater and urged followers to drop the mudslinging.

Sheila Schuller Coleman is the daughter of Crystal Cathedral founder Robert Schuller, the retired pastor famous for his “Hour of Power” broadcasts who earlier this month severed ties with the church in a bitter dispute over millions of dollars he and close relatives claim to be owed.

Coleman, who a week ago led worship at the cathedral, led her first Sunday service since starting a new church in recent days, by inviting followers to an Orange County cineplex. About 100 worshippers attended the simple, no-frills service.

“We will refrain from speaking ill of any other church,” Coleman said from the front of a movie theater, as she led her congregation called Hope Center of Christ.

“I don’t like the mudslinging on my Facebook wall,” she added. “We are a church that will proceed no matter what.”

The split between the Schuller family and Crystal Cathedral ends a relationship that saw the cathedral, distinguished by its 10,000 panes of glass, become a Protestant icon. Millions of TV viewers over the decades tuned in to see services bathed in a sunlight as Schuller preached the principles of “possibility thinking.”

But following Schuller’s retirement as senior pastor in 2006, the church suffered declining attendance and donations and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2010. As a result, the cathedral itself was sold for $57.5 million to a local Roman Catholic diocese.

The sale calls for those worshipers who stayed at the cathedral, rather than follow Coleman to her new church, to find a new place of worship within three years.

ATTENDANCE REBOUND

On Sunday, about 1,400 worshippers attended English-language morning services at the cathedral, compared to about 600 when Coleman led the services, said Crystal Cathedral Executive Pastor Bill Bennett.

With a guest pastor at the pulpit, services returned to what the church described as more traditional footing than worshippers had been used to with Coleman. A choir in white robes sang hymns, and a soloist performed “Amazing Grace.”

There remained elements of Schuller’s grand vision for the church, as two giant screens displayed the services, which were taped for a future broadcast of “Hour of Power.”

“The congregation really took the church back as opposed to having a family running the church,” said Fred Gillette, who was in the pews and also works as a minister.

Crystal Cathedral is located in the suburban community of Garden Grove, about 30 miles southeast of Los Angeles. At its height under Schuller, the church had 10,000 people attend Sunday services, and counted among its visitors everyone from former President Gerald Ford to the late comedian Milton Berle.

Earlier this month, Crystal Cathedral announced that “Hour of Power,” which is available to most U.S. cable subscribers and can be seen overseas, was going into reruns amid a management shakeup that included the ouster of Coleman’s husband.

BACK TO THE MOVIES

Before Crystal Cathedral opened in 1980, the congregation had more humble beginnings, starting in an Orange County drive-in theater in 1955.

On Sunday, as Coleman stood before her congregation in a movie theater, the comedy “21 Jump Street” played in a next-door theater.

Dressed in casual clothes, the movie-theater congregation sat with neither popcorn nor drinks in their hands as they listened to Coleman, whose Hope Center of Christ is still looking for a permanent home.

“I’m not planning on taking a paycheck anytime in the near future,” Coleman told her followers.

The topic of pay for the Schullers has become a contentious one at Crystal Cathedral.

Schuller, 85, and his wife Arvella, who did not attend church at Crystal Cathedral or at their daughter’s services on Sunday — although they say they support her — announced in March that they had resigned from the board of Crystal Cathedral over a financial dispute.

Robert and Arvella Schuller and their daughter, Carol Schuller Milner, have said in bankruptcy court papers that the church owes them for copyright infringement and other claims.

An intellectual property claim by the Schullers covers such matters as their past appearances in “Hour of Power” and the format that Arvella developed for the broadcasts, said their attorney, Carl Grumer.

Crystal Cathedral chairman of the board John Charles has said in a statement that the Schullers want $3.5 million to settle the dispute and that would leave the church with “virtually no funds to continue its ministries.”

When Robert Schuller quit leading services in 2006, he was succeeded by his son Robert A. Schuller, who then left in 2008. The son’s separation agreement with the church called for him to receive a Mercedes-Benz and provided that he and his wife would continue to receive their salary for a year, bankruptcy court papers show.

Coleman took over after her brother, but attendance dropped sharply under her, observers said.

Robert Schuller continued to receive compensation from the church after his 2006 retirement, and in 2009 he collected a total of $257,000, court papers indicate.

The Schullers collected “huge salaries” while at the helm of Crystal Cathedral, said Ben Hubbard, a professor emeritus of comparative religion at California State University, Fullerton.

“They had a quite comfortable lifestyle and they just didn’t manage the books and use good accounting practices and good budget management, and it just went boom,” said Hubbard, who has watched developments at the church.

But Robert Schuller raised tens of millions of dollars for the church after he left as senior pastor, said attorney Carl Grumer, who represents both Robert and Arvella Schuller.

“They regret where things have come to,” Grumer said. “They certainly would have liked the ministry to continue as it was, it’s unfortunate circumstances required some tough choices.”

(Writing by  Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by  Paul Thomasch)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/19/us-crystal-cathedral-california-idUSBRE82I03X20120319

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2. Sic Transit ¢â‚¬ ¦

— Martin E. Marty   Sightings    3/19/2012  

 ¢â‚¬Å“Public religion, ¢â‚¬  the rubric for these e-columns and the Center which issues them, often gets reduced to  ¢â‚¬Å“religion and politics, ¢â‚¬  but  ¢â‚¬Å“public ¢â‚¬  has a broader reach. Included are, for example, the arts, education, and ¢â‚¬”yes! ¢â‚¬”dealing with God and church (and its analogs), in  ¢â‚¬Å“theology ¢â‚¬  and  ¢â‚¬Å“ecclesiology. ¢â‚¬  This month two sensations in these received attention. One was the death of  ¢â‚¬Å“Death of God ¢â‚¬  theologian William Hamilton, whose passing elicited a  New York Times  obituary. The other was Robert Schuller, who merely and largely passed from the scene after he was broken by and then broke with the leadership of the Crystal Cathedral in California. Both men were regularly called  ¢â‚¬Å“sensations; ¢â‚¬  but today we would call them celebrities ¢â‚¬”a rare breed in theology and church life.

Editorial comment on both evoked reflections such as  ¢â‚¬Å“Sic transit. . . ¢â‚¬  on how everything passes, or  ¢â‚¬Å“De mortuis. . . ¢â‚¬  the reminder not to speak ill of the dead or with  Schadenfreude, joy in others ¢â‚¬â„¢ misfortunes when they fall. Let me check in with the mention that I have no personal case against either.  ¢â‚¬Å“Bill ¢â‚¬  Hamilton, almost fifty years ago, invited me to give the Rauschenbush lectures at his then-school, Colgate-Rochester Divinity School. That seminary became uncomfortable when the  ¢â‚¬Å“Death of God ¢â‚¬  flap, promoted on a  Time  magazine cover, became a sensation. We remained friends, now at a distance, but I had thought rarely about him for decades and could not find him during a research project, even with Google ¢â‚¬â„¢s help. He had faded into teaching English and then retirement, if either is truly a  ¢â‚¬Å“fading. ¢â‚¬  It took eleven days for the  Times  to obit him.

Robert H. Schuller was much, much more in the news in recent seasons, as the press covered him being  ¢â‚¬Å“ousted ¢â‚¬  from leadership of the board at his invention, the pioneer, some say, of the still thriving mega-church movement and the continuing transformations of  ¢â‚¬Å“self-esteem ¢â‚¬  theology, on which he acquired the patent (from Norman Vincent Peale). While mega-church and self-esteem are not my cups of tea, Schuller and I had some positive interactions. He cited me despite what I thought was a negative comment: that his message was not theology but a psychology of self-esteem.

What happened? His moment passed, as everyone ¢â‚¬â„¢s moment passes. Countless non-crystal mega-church buildings, though none matched his, replicated his intentions. While many of these make bankruptcy news, few of them represented a multi-million investment and debt. As for self-esteem, the  ¢â‚¬Å“Prosperity Gospel ¢â‚¬  preachers carry things so far that in contrast he sounds like the country preacher of Good News. Some coverage picked up on the theme of the folly of family ventures, since Schuller-vs.-Schuller battles led to his demise. Malinowski:  ¢â‚¬Å“Aggression, like charity, begins at home. ¢â‚¬ 

It is possible to greet these moments with sympathy and sadness ¢â‚¬”and it is then necessary to move on. While one has to gawk in awe at bold experiments and sensations, it might well be that what many will take from these passings is the opportunity to take a new look at the unsensational theologizing and ministries which more quietly guide the spiritual quests and community spirit of millions whom  Time  and  Timesseldom notice. Some of the religious leaders in seminaries, chapels and cathedrals may look up now and then, take notes, learn a bit, and then head back to the classroom or the sanctuary, where they can effect less noticed outcomes. Still, one hopes they do not lapse into timidity and passiveness, modes of being that also can limit leadership ¢â‚¬â„¢s effectiveness in religion.

References

Paul Vitello,  ¢â‚¬Å“William Hamilton Dies at 87; Known for  ¢â‚¬ËœDeath of God ¢â‚¬â„¢, ¢â‚¬   New York Times, March 10, 2012.

Jeff Barnard,  ¢â‚¬Å“God Is Dead Theologian William Hamilton Dead at 87, ¢â‚¬  Huffington Post, February 29, 2012.

The Rauschenbush lectures in 1963 were published as the book  Varieties of Unbelief  (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964) and Doubleday Anchor (1966) ), both of them certainly long out of print.  Sic transit,  and, since they are dead books,  De mortuis. . .  

Martin E. Marty’s  biography, publications, and contact information can be found at  www.memarty.com.  

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Sightings  comes from the  Martin Marty Center  at the University of Chicago Divinity School.
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