KARLI KING
Staff Writer
There is a small church that sits in the hills a few miles north of Pepperdine on Pacific Coast Highway. Every Sunday morning, a group of believers gathers there to worship. The small church is filled with modest wooden pews, an organ and brightly colored stained glass windows. A carved wooden crucifix hangs over the altar.
This is St. Aidan’s Episcopal Church, a place for people to grow and learn in their faith. It is a unique mixture of the traditional aspects of the Episcopalian denomination, mixed with some of Malibu’s characteristically laid-back attitude.
One person who calls this place her church home is Sara Banta, a Pepperdine music professor and head of the instrumental department. She came to St. Aidan’s more than 12 years ago when she was hired as the minister of music, and she describes her job as exactly what the title says: “ministering to people through music.”
Banta built up the church’s choir to 15 individuals at some points, including a few Pepperdine students.
Senior Delynne Collins has been involved with the choir for three years. She works closely with Banta and many other church members to enhance the music program, specifically the choral element. She said she believes it’s been an excellent opportunity to grow and make a difference in the lives of other choir members.
“Instead of just going to church every morning, they feel really great about being a part of the choir,” Collins said of her fellow chorales. “They have great personalities, but also take their participation very seriously. If we all had that much motivation, it would be amazing how much we could accomplish.”
St. Aidan’s is composed of about 160 family units, with anywhere from 85 to 100 members attending each week, according its rector, the Rev. Joyce Stickney.
Stickney began Aug. 28, after a series of interim leaders followed the Rev. Susan Klein’s departure in 2004. Klein served at St. Aidan’s for 14 years and left to take a position at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Los Angeles.
“I was looking to be the rector of a new ministry and had heard about St. Aidan’s,” Stickney said. She comes from St. Augustine by the Sea Episcopal Church in Santa Monica, but grew up abroad.
“It’s been wonderful,” Stickney said of the transition so far. “The people are very warm, hospitable, excited, and I feel like I’ve entered into a community — an extended family, which is really precious to have that sort of experience in L.A.”
Another aspect of St. Aidan’s is the opportunities readily available for people to be involved in the church’s outreach programs. Stickney said those programs include a lunch served to AIDS victims at the county hospital and participation in a school program for homeless children, as well as recent money raised for Hurricane Katrina victims.
Services are fairly liturgical, with plenty of traditions and sacrament celebration. Stickney said it’s similar to a reformed Roman Catholic church but more progressive.
“We combine Scripture, tradition and reason,” she said. “We don’t ask people to leave their brains at the door, though.”
10-06-2005
