Saratoga News

Photograph by Robert Scheer

Acolytes completing duties after morning services are St. Andrew's first-graders (left) Dylan Fish and Matthew Martina.

The High Road

St. Andrew's has become the church that Highway 85 built

By Mary Ann Cook

The loss of connection is the gravest, most pervasive woe facing society today, says the Rev. Ernest W. Cockrell, rector of St. Andrew's Episcopal Church in Saratoga. "No matter how long and hard we work, often there's a sense of purposelessness in our lives, a loss of community, a lack of meaning. We may catch ourselves up short to ask, 'What is the sense of my life? What gives it meaning?' "

St. Andrew's is dedicated to doing something--plenty of somethings--to rectify that lack in present-day society, Cockrell says. "How can we serve you, and how can we help you serve others?" is both byword and mission that Cockrell's church sets itself.

Today, St. Andrew's, with a membership of some 1,800 families, is the largest church in the diocese, and the diocese stretches from Palo Alto to Arroyo Grande. In the past year, 100 new families joined the church.

It would have been hard to imagine the church growing so large back when a group of prospective parishioners first began meeting more than 40 years ago at the IOOF Hall in Saratoga. Roy Strasburger was in San Antonio at the time, and he was assigned to go to Saratoga as vicar of the little parish. He stayed on for 30 years, and it was under his direction that the current church and school on Saratoga Avenue were constructed. Strasburger and his wife Pat are now retired and living in Los Gatos. In its early days, Saratoga was an isolated community, and parishioners were mostly local residents. In some circles, St. Andrew's was reputed to be a "country club church."

These days, thanks in large part to the opening of Highway 85, the church draws its members from as far away as Palo Alto and Gilroy, and its reach extends around the world. It's known as a young activist church.

All this year--and this week, in particular--St. Andrew's celebrates its 40th anniversary. A festival service is planned for Nov. 30 at 9 a.m. The 60-member St. Andrew's choir will sing, accompanied by the church's pipe organ, the largest in the valley. There also will be music emanating from five octaves' worth of hand bells, which will be dedicated earlier. The day also will include Scottish dancing, a bagpiper and food. Those attending are encouraged to wear tartans.

So many things are going on within this parish that it's like a small city, a community in its own right, encompassing spirituality, education and outreach.

For starters, there's the school, which serves preschoolers to eighth-graders and whose tradition is academic excellence. Some 450 youngsters are enrolled here. The school population is only 20 percent Episcopalian. Other faiths represented are Jewish, Muslim and Hindu, as well as other Christian denominations.

Besides religious training, another emphasis in this school is community service. Each child is responsible for a community project. It may be something like making homemade Christmas stockings for veterans or adopting a "grandparent" from the IOOF Home.

Whatever the assignment, each of the youngsters is committed to it and excited about it, Cockrell says. Masankho Banda is in charge of this aspect of the youth program, and he also teaches religion to the younger grades at the school. The Rev. Julian Lentz is headmaster of the school.

St. Andrew's has an extensive menu of educational programs, including a four-year program used in training seminarians. Some 16 people are currently enrolled in the ministry classes. "We need to get some 202 and 303 courses going," says Cockrell of advanced religious seminars for those who want to dig deeper. Besides Bible study and comparative religion classes, St. Andrew's offers workshops in secular matters, such as practical steps to take if you've been downsized.

The St. Andrew's outreach program is varied and broad and includes an international arm, as well as the pastoral program that lends support to those in trouble close to home. The international program is financed in large part by a $700,000 bequest from Winifred Frost. Her will specifically requested that the money be spent to provide medical assistance to countries throughout the world.

This largesse enabled St. Andrew's to set up what is called the SAMA (St. Andrew's Medical Assistance) program. In Hebrew, Sama means listening, so the name serves double duty. St. Andrew's has a resident outreach director in Israel, Nancy Dinsmore. The church sends supplies and volunteers to its outposts. Volunteer missionaries sign up for stays of at least two weeks. They can combine pilgrimages to the Holy Land with their volunteer work there.

Doctors, nurses and engineers are particularly in demand in this program, but others, too, can be matched up with needed services. Besides the outreach in Israel, St. Andrew's has medical posts set up in India, Bosnia, Rwanda and Haiti.

A recent package to Haiti was in keeping with the season: 80 pounds of candy collected from children of the parish after Halloween. Along with the candy went toothbrushes and toothpaste, the brainstorm of a dentist clergyman, the Rev. Fellow C. Stearns.

The next box to be sent to Haiti will be full of T-shirts. Parishioners will be asked to bring T-shirts to services. "Whenever any of us goes overseas to one of the outreach destinations, we make sure we bring along an extra suitcase filled with clothing, food or medical supplies," Cockrell says.

According to the Rev. Kristin (Tina) Sundquist, music director and parish administrator, it's highly unusual for a church to have such an extensive outreach program worldwide. Without the windfall, it wouldn't have been possible, but she credits the church's rector for having "the vision for an international linkup."

The parish's pastoral program is under the direction of the Rev. Portia Mather-Hempler, associate rector. She's second in command in the hierarchy of 10 in the St. Andrew's clergy.

The pastoral program offers solace to those in need, whether because of an illness, a crisis in the family, divorce or death. Mather-Hempler can call on volunteers called the Stephen ministers, who are trained at church-sponsored sessions. These counselor/volunteers serve as listeners to families and individuals at times of crisis, and their work is done in strictest confidence.

There's also a health ministry under the supervision of Beverly Bennett, senior warden. She's a retired nurse, and some 75 people under her direction drive and take meals to shut-ins, the sick and the elderly. Bennett runs Blood Pressure Sundays periodically and holds health fairs several times a year at the church.

The emphasis in the health program is on the unity of mind, body and spirit, Cockrell says, and the health education offered stresses the importance of taking responsibility for your own physical well-being. The idea is for people to learn to take an aggressive part in their own health care, instead of being passive about their treatment and care.

The Echo Shop, the church's resale store on Big Basin Way, is yet another form of outreach. Proceeds from the shop are donated to charity. Each year the Community Ministries board, which is composed of parishioners, decides which charities will receive that year's proceeds. The shop is staffed by volunteers, some of whom are not church members but want to participate in the charitable goals of the shop.

Sundquist, who is also an ordained priest, says that St. Andrew's prides itself on being "warm, caring and celebratory. We ask newcomers to get involved." Sundquist notes that for a time, the church attracted few young families, but these days, one of the lovely sounds on Sunday mornings is the sound of babies crying.

About 500 parishioners attend the 10 a.m. services on Sunday, with another 100 on average attending the 8 a.m. offering in the chapel.

As St. Andrew's is the largest church in the diocese, at least three priests are needed to help with the communion service. Three different altars are used, and four priests would be even better, Sundquist says.

Three members of St. Andrew's clergy are worker/priests. They've completed seminary school and are ordained ministers, but work in other fields during the week. Besides dentist Stearns, they are the Rev. Floyd Frisch, a Los Gatos lawyer, and the Rev. William Slagle, an engineer.

Another thing unusual about the St. Andrew's clerical lineup: One of their clergy, Richard L. Jeske, is a Lutheran minister. St. Andrew's is involved in what Cockrell calls a "groundbreaking experiment" whereby the Lutheran Church and the Episcopal Church share resources and materials.

Nationally, such an ecumenical undertaking won enough Episcopal votes to pass, but not enough Lutheran votes. Undaunted, Cockrell and Jeske are working out an arrangement on a local level, with the anticipation that the national leadership will fall in line sometime in the future.

The remaining clergy members are the Rev. Margaret Bourne-Goodwin, youth minister, and the Rev. Max Wright, deacon.

There's a 50-member choir, with a reputation strong enough to elicit requests from overseas. Two years ago, the choir toured England. Its director is Hal Sundquist, Tina's husband. St. Andrews is the official sponsor of the Saratoga Symphony. "Musical groups love to perform here because our acoustics are marvelous," Sundquist enthuses.

There is also a bell choir, a folk group and a youth choir. Musical celebrations at St. Andrew's "bring together heart and mind to celebrate the life of the family," as Cockrell puts it. He can be found on drums on some of these musical occasions.

"People are looking for certainties, an underpinning within realism," Cockrell says about the burgeoning church population in his care, adding that people's focus on religion is reflected in the popular culture.

"Why are there so many programs on TV relating to angels?" he asks. "What do we trust in, what can we trust in? These are the questions people are asking themselves. That, after all, is what faith means--trust."

And the Episcopal church, he points out, is based upon scripture, tradition and reason. "That allows all of us to think for ourselves, allows for great diversity."

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