“God, You inhabit the praise of Your people,” said associate pastor Tony Inyang during the prayers before the service began, and the praise team started in making a suitable habitation. “Welcome into this place,” sang …

Traces of the old tile pattern still darken the stained concrete floor at Christ Lutheran, but they don’t distract much from the surface’s overall look — that of parched, cracked earth. It’s in sharp contrast …

The website for the California Marriage Protection Act (protectmarriagesd) features a “Protect Marriage” timeline, one which incorporates both spiritual and political efforts. (The act seeks to amend the California State Constitution so that marriage will …

“Give me that old-time religion/ It’s good enough for me,” sang the Chancel Choir from their section of seats at the Lamb’s Players Theatre. And Coronado Community Church did give that old-time religion, at least …

For Rob Barnett, the long and winding road to VinVillage is finally coming to an end. The technical snags for his wine-based social-networking site — devoted to “creating locally based social wine groups and connecting …

“I wish I’d known you were coming,” said Pastor Dan Slagle when I spoke with him after the service. If he had known, he could have warned me that part of the regular band was …

Toddlers sprawled quietly on the patch of thick carpet at the back of the dim auditorium, filling in their coloring books. Behind them stood a row of tables holding free Bibles, juice, sandwich bags filled …

“Never place a period where God has put a comma.” — Gracie Allen, quoted in UCC pamphlet. "God is Still Speaking” read the caption on the name-tag the greeter gave me on my way into …

There were in St. Elizabeth’s all the accoutrements you might expect to find in a grand-scale Catholic church; it was just that the statues of the saints, the stations of the cross, the devotional banners …

Among the posters and banners lining the long wall behind the pulpit in the storefront church was one that collected the names ascribed to Jesus in Scripture: “The resurrection and the life/ Judge/ Lord of …

The San Diego winemaker tour continues. This month, Costa Brava in Pacific Beach played host to Spanish winemaking icon Alejandro Fernández and his representatives from Classical Wines. “I was working as a retailer in the …

It was Father’s Day on Sunday, and fathers got at least three rounds of shouts and applause at Bayview Baptist Church — grandfathers and great-grandfathers, too. (At least five of the latter were in attendance.) …

Portrait of a church on the cusp: North Coast Calvary Chapel, founded as a home Bible study in Encinitas, was housed five years in a YMCA, then ten years in the Vulcan Center (now Encinitas …

The backlit wooden cross hanging on the wall above the stage was bare, but Christ crucified was a prominent feature of Sunday’s service at Pacific Beach Bible Church. I say prominent, not exclusive; the mentions …

The interior of St. Margaret’s church has an oddly spare quality — the huge central dome gives the impression of an old-fashioned Catholic church, the sort that might be swarming with statues and stained glass. …

A splatter of yellow vomit, left over from Saturday night’s Gaslamp revelry, baked in the Sunday-morning sun. Around it, glossy promo cards featured pictures of lightly dressed young women, advertising the weekend’s festivities. Down the …

Mothers got more than just a mention at Faith Community’s Sunday service, but they weren’t the main attraction. The music leader paused in the midst of the opening 30 minutes of hymns to ask “a …

Things I took away from Sunday’s service at Father’s House Church International: Israel and the Jews are important. An Israeli flag stood on one side of the stage. One of the hymns, in the midst …

From the outset, Kensington Community Church made the case for the “Community” part of its name. A congregant introduced herself to me, a visiting stranger, and asked if I would like company, or if I …

San Diego’s social status is ascendant. Of course, you knew that already — you live here. You’ve eaten in the new restaurants, drunk in the new nightclubs, partied in the new hotels. I mention it …

“You are here,” reads the tagline below “Grace” on the banners and bulletin covers for Grace San Diego. Undoubtedly, more than one layer of meaning is intended here — layer two may be something like, …

There is perhaps no finer marketing machine in all the wine world than the one that operates out of Champagne. (You don’t get to be the world’s official party wine without doing something right.) And …

I didn’t get to church on Sunday — this is what, my third flu this year? Pathetic, or maybe just scary. (“The germs are winning,” says Dad.) So I’ve got nothing on that front. But …

The La Mesa library recently placed California Wine a Sunset Pictorial, published in 1973 and edited by the estimable Bob Thompson, in a cardboard box outside the building’s front door. A visual history of the …

Jason Evans sat at one corner of his dining room table, his wife Brooke seated across from him, two young children at the head of the table between them. An array of crosses hung above …

Erica Martenson is not a scientist. Rather, she is a gardener. In her big backyard in Napa, she says, she has “several fruit trees and a small area where I have a vegetable garden. At …

File Under: Fiction Is Good for You. I was reading Peter May’s crime novel The Critic, which took as a dramatic starting point the murder of a famous wine critic, one Gil Petty. The hero, …

“Allow yourself to simply be one with the service,” read one of the suggestions in the program for the Good Friday Taizé Service at Light of Life Church. But there’s nothing like a nagging cough …

The 8:30 a.m. is the more contemplative of the Sunday services at La Mesa United Methodist. Throughout Lent, elements of Taizé spirituality have been incorporated into the service. The worship bulletin (church motto: “Open hearts. …

‘When you look into the abyss, the abyss also looks into you.” That line, from the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, serves as part of the epigraph for Peter May’s crime novel The Critic. The novel …

Oh, now this is a fun idea for a story: an American wine critic — one of those make-it-or-break-it critics in the mold of Robert Parker — winds up murdered, pickled in a vat of …

A pretty country quilt lay across an old four-poster bed on the stage at Pathways Community Church. The bed had been there throughout the church’s “Sexual Revolution” series — in which “revolution” was defined as …

“I want to encourage you to enjoy really close fellowship today — about 15 people to a pew,” said Pastor Mark Wilkinson as the congregation poured through the doors of the small, spare church. The …

‘Why don’t you write a book about wine?” You write about a subject long enough — nine years here at “Crush” — and you’re bound to hear it a few times. And every time I …

Don’t misunderstand — Robert Baizer is glad he went to Sundance. He had a lovely time — made even lovelier by the happy reception accorded Bottle Shock, a film he helped to finance. By festival’s …

And he showed me a river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. — Revelation 22:1 That was the line that came to mind upon …

Besides the usual loincloth, the crucified Christ hanging in the front of the church was draped with a purple stole, which draped over His chest as it ran from one arm to the other, and …

J. Todd Harris is a movie producer. That means that he gets films made. “I’m just like any other guy that goes and tries to find projects and tries to find financing and a director …

By now, most people with even a passing interest in wine have heard of the Sideways effect: a movie takes Pinot Noir as a central metaphor for its thin-skinned and temperamental protagonist, and hey presto, …

A pedestal stood in the vestibule of the Wyle Chapel at Torrey Pines Christian Church, its sandy surface studded with candles. Another pedestal stood at the entrance to the church proper, this one bearing two …

"First to Fight for Right and Freedom," reads the title of the big military print on the tasting room wall at Carlsbad Wine Merchants. The painting depicts a group of Marines moving along a ruined …

“The term ‘emergent worship’ doesn’t really provide a good definition,” said Pastor Michael Spitters when we spoke before Sunday’s service. “We don’t know what we’re emerging to become. We just know that we’re getting out …

Portland didn’t agree with marketing VP Kathy Bankerd. Her employers at the tech company InFocus had moved her up north and bought her a house, but she still hadn’t sold her home in sunny SoCal. …

Oooohhhh, my head. My back. My joints. My everything. Sick, sick, sick. No way I’m getting to church today. No way I’m even getting out of bed. Thank God — so to speak — for …

“I have no hands but yours,” read the plaque below the statue of Christ outside the church. No tengo mas manos que las tuyas. And it was literally true — Jesus’ outstretched arms ended at …

The hills across the road from Steve Chapin’s Temecula vineyards — situated out past the tourist-friendly wineries and a short hop from Lake Skinner — are fallow now. Chaparral grows where vines once stood — …

“A church for Ken-Tal,” read the glossy cardboard flyer that arrived in my mailbox. The usual photos of lovely, multiethnic churchgoers were accompanied by the less usual word “skeptical.” Ah. Going for the affluent intellectual …

‘Cork is random,” observes Michael Friedman, CEO for Oneo Closures North America. “It’s a plant. When you punch a cork out of a piece of bark, it’s very unusual to get one that’s absolutely perfect, …

“We went to Europe four or five years ago,” said 20something pastor Jeff Holmes, “and we saw that the church...was not really relevant to the real life of most people — the young people, especially. …

A number of spiritual currents ran through the service on the Sunday before Christmas at Hope United Methodist; several made themselves felt within the choir’s opening set. We began with the traditional: a straight-up rendition …