Renegade Sacramento-area church services: One goes ahead with a crowd, second parish cancels

Defying orders from public health officials and California Gov. Gavin Newsom to avoid large gatherings during the coronavirus pandemic, a church in Roseville held a two-hour service Sunday morning attended by dozens of parishioners. A church in Lodi that had pledged to hold in-person services was forced to cancel.

Abundant Life Fellowship Church went ahead as promised, blocking outsiders and media from coming inside or interviewing attendees, but allowing parishioners to file in from more than 40 vehicles that were in the parking lot near downtown Roseville.

Pastor Doug Bird had not been available for an interview since Friday, but posted a vow to continue on the church Facebook page.

“If you are a visitor (not a part of ALF) and plan on traveling here to ‘shame’ us, SHAME ON YOU!” he wrote. “In these dangerous times you will be putting our church community at GREAT risk! YOU ARE NOT WELCOMED AT THIS CHURCH.

“This is not a show! This is not a game! WE ARE AT WAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

“Until this crisis is behind us this is NOT Church as usual.”

One parishioner — a man wearing a “President Trump, Make America Great Again” cap — declined to talk when asked for comment.

“Not interested,” he said.

Church officials then asked The Sacramento Bee to leave their property.

After a two-hour service at which he told parishioners to remain 6 feet apart, Bird announced he was ending in-person services until further notice.

In an interview with The Bee, Bird said he received an email from county health officials Saturday encouraging him to halt services. But he said he held Palm Sunday services because many of his congregants have no access to the internet and needed to hear the announcement from him.

Bird added that he remains confused about whether the county health department and the governor have the legal right to make such orders and does not know what the punishment could be for ignoring them. “I don’t know Gavin Newsom, I don’t know any of those guys,” he said.

Bird added that a main reason for him to transition to online services was because of the vitriol aimed at the church since word got out that services were continuing.

“People attacking us, cussing my secretary out, and the sad thing is most of them are Christians,” he said. He added that telling churches to shut down when other establishments remain open infringes on civil rights and the First Amendment, and worries that the pandemic is a sign of the “end times.”

“I think this is the sign of the end times, this will usher in the mark of the beast,” he said.

But, he said, he does not fear the coronavirus.

“I am not afraid of the virus,” he said. “I’m not afraid of getting anything.”

A Roseville police SUV sat in a parking lot across Atlantic Street for part of the morning Sunday, but made no effort to halt the event.

Most houses of worship in the Sacramento region have canceled in-person services, even as the world’s major religions enter one of the holiest times of the year. Palm Sunday, Easter, Passover and Ramadan will all be celebrated in the coming days, and religious traditions celebrated for centuries have been upended due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Sacramento health officials have said roughly one-third of the county’s coronavirus cases are linked to religious gatherings, including more than 70 connected to the Bethany Slavic Missionary Church near Rancho Cordova.

Lodi church cancels service

The scene in Roseville stood in stark contrast to events in Lodi, where at Palm Sunday services at Cross Culture Christian Center were reduced to brief curbside prayers, a handout sermon and a wave of the hand — with police officers standing nearby.

The church, which had been holding in-person services in defiance of coronavirus “stay at home” orders issued by Newsom and San Joaquin County authorities, was forced to cancel its Palm Sunday service after its landlord — a church that had suspended its services two weeks ago — locked the building on orders from the county’s public health officer.

The church’s lawyer, a San Diego religious freedom advocate, vowed Saturday that services would be held in spite of the latest order. But less than an hour before services were scheduled to begin, four Lodi police officers, all wearing surgical masks and gloves, met with Pastor Jon Duncan outside the church and handed him a copy of the public health officer’s order, which was released late Friday.

After a 10-minute discussion, the pastor agreed that services wouldn’t take place.

“I appreciate your respecting the order,” police Capt. Sierra Brucia told Duncan as a couple of congregants stood nearby.

“If the door was open ...” Duncan replied, and then shrugged. Brucia told the pastor he could theoretically be arrested for violating the order, but “we want to handle this on the lowest possible level.”

Duncan and Brucia agreed on a compromise: The pastor was allowed to hand out copies of his sermon and pray briefly with individual congregants as they arrived in their cars.

One by one, congregants drove up, spoke for a moment with Duncan as he knelt on the pavement and his wife, Angela, stood nearby with her hand held out in prayer. He handed them a copy of his sermon — which made no mention of the conflict with local authorities — and they drove off, some dabbing tears.

“It’s the most important time for our church to be together now,” said one congregant, Carole Webster, her voice choking with emotion. “America needs our prayers now.”

She said she was worried about the future of religious freedom.

The church has been sparring with Lodi authorities for more than a week, after two police officers interrupted a Wednesday evening service March 25. A few days later they returned and posted a “notice of public nuisance” on the church’s main entrance. That prompted church attorney Dean Broyles, head of a San Diego organization called the National Center for Law & Policy, to send city officials a cease-and-desist letter, arguing that the city was violating Cross Culture’s First Amendment right to worship and peaceably assemble.

Legal experts say the state and county orders take precedence over the church’s rights. Duncan said in an interview that the church will continue to fight, adding that Broyles “has a good handle on the case law.

“We will move forward as a church,” the pastor added.

Duncan said the church, which typically draws about 80 people to its services, received threats of violence late Saturday. He said he’s reported the threats to the Sheriff’s Office.

He added that the church has been practicing social distancing at its services.

“We take the virus seriously,” he said. But “we don’t believe the virus suspends the First Amendment.”

This story was originally published April 5, 2020 at 1:22 PM.