Our Mission and History
Above, St. John’s Ascension window.





St. John the Evangelist
St. John the Evangelist, our parish’s patron saint, is traditionally the name used to refer to the author of the Gospel of John and the First Epistle of John, who has been identified with John, one of the twelve Apostles of Jesus. The author of the Gospel of John never identifies himself, but is generally assumed to be the “beloved disciple” or “the one whom Jesus loved,” repeatedly referred to in John’s Gospel. However, it is disputed whether John the Evangelist was in fact the Beloved Disciple. Tradition also holds that it was John alone of the Apostles who remained near the foot of the cross on Calvary with the mother of Jesus and the pious women, and who took God’s mother into his care as the last legacy of Christ. He is also believed to be the only apostle to have lived into old age and to have escaped a death of martyrdom.

When new members join our church, they receive an icon of St. John pictured as the Evangelist, an older man holding his Gospel (above). Despite the disputes about the relationship of John the Evangelist, the Apostle, and the Beloved Disciple, we have chosen to use another icon, that of the Beloved Disciple, on our website as an icon of our parish. We feel this image conveys the loving Christ-centered community that our parish aspires to be and communicates the special relationship we each long to have with our Lord Jesus Christ.

Mission, Vision, Values
Our mission is to live, love, and serve in the hope and joy of the risen Christ.

Our vision: We seek to be a Christian community in which people of all sexual orientations, gender identities, cultures, and colors are welcomed and their gifts are celebrated.

Our Core Values
We are a Eucharistic worshipping community in the Anglican tradition. Our celebration of the Holy Eucharist, marked by beautiful music, is the heart of our common life.

We are a Christ-centered community. For people of all ages, we value faith formation that engages the mind as well as the heart, and provides the foundation for vibrant lay ministry.

We have a special vocation to respect and advocate for the dignity of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people. This by no means defines the full extent of our baptismal promise to respect the dignity of every human being, but it is a crucial element of that promise in our ministry context.

We value diversity and welcome anyone who wishes to explore Christian faith and practice.

We value connection, and strive to promote a sense of belonging among the members of the parish that readily includes newcomers. This is often talked about in terms of communication or pastoral care or hospitality, but it is fundamentally about feeling connected to God and to one another.

We value the North Mission neighborhood. Our location in this particular place spiritually anchors us and gives substance to our mission and ministry. This neighborhood keeps us grounded in reality.

Parish History: Celebrating 150 Years in the Mission, 1857-2007
Overview
The history of St. John’s provides interesting glimpses into the early life of San Francisco. Its fortunes seem to mirror those of the ever-changing north Mission neighborhood, as well as the evolving life of mainline Protestant churches in the inner cities of the United States.

The third parish established in the new Episcopal Diocese of California, St. John’s began as a pioneer outpost in rented space at the edge of swamps and sand dunes. It quickly grew into a thriving “society parish” of sorts, helping to found schools, hospitals, and chapels in the rapidly growing Mission District. But in the wake of the economic and demographic changes in the Mission that followed the 1906 earthquake, St. John’s changed, too.

An early St. John’s leader wrote in 1887 that, “While the church has never been the religious home of a rich or fashionable congregation, it has always been the chosen field for a small but growing band of quiet, earnest and practical Christian workers.” That characterization might also fit St. John’s members today. While for most of its history, the parish has struggled to sustain membership and meet its budget, its members have continued to play leadership roles in the surrounding neighborhood and beyond, through professional and volunteer service to local and global educational, human rights, and social service organizations, and the Episcopal Church. Although on the small side, with around 90 members, average Sunday attendance of 72, and recent Easter-Christmas attendance around 100, St. John’s maintains a solid presence in the neighborhood and in the Episcopal Church. It boasts among the highest average per person annual pledge in the Diocese of California, and for years has been known for sponsoring a disproportionately large number of candidates for ordination.

St. John’s Early Days, 1857-1906
St. John’s first public worship service was held on November 22, 1857, in space rented from a Methodist society around 15th and 16th, Valencia and Mission Streets. Then regarded as outside the city, the area was known as “Mission Dolores” and was separated from the main San Francisco business and residential districts by three miles of intervening swamps and sand dunes. With the exception of a few houses on and around 16th Street, the surrounding area was covered with agricultural fields and cow pastures, and rippling streams flowed into the sloughs and marshes of Mission Creek.

A daily stage ran between the “City” and the “Mission” over a planked road, now Mission
Street, and the fare for the trip each way was 25 cents. Early choir members, nonresident in the Mission, made the bumpy trip each Sunday. “That they continued in their assistance of St. John’s under such difficulties for several years speaks strongly for their Christian zeal,” writes early church historian and senior warden, the Hon. F.W. Van Reynegom.

The church struggled financially in its early years (as it would it in years to come). A colorful story relates how one Sunday, when the doors of the building rented for church services were locked due to lack of rent payment, and the “vestrymen” went off to negotiate with the landlord, the legendary Mrs. Green climbed through a window and let the St. John’s worshipers and Sunday school children in from the rain. The vestrymen returned to find the church doors open and the Sunday school in active operation under Mrs. Green’s charge. She could hardly have known that the pluck she displayed on that soggy day was the first recorded example of something known as “the spirit of St. John's.”




St. John’s I, c. 1862

Mirroring the rapid growth of San Francisco in these years, St. John’s grew rapidly as well. By 1861, St. John’s was able to hire its first rector, the Rev. Thomas Brotherton, and in 1862, a new church building, which could accommodate 250, opened, with fundraising spearheaded by the newly created Ladies Parish Aid Society. The first St. John’s was a redwood church in Pointed Gothic style at the northeast corner of Valencia and 15th Streets.




The Hon. F.W. Van Reynegom, a San Francisco judge and long-time senior warden during St. John’s “golden age.” He died just weeks before the 1906 earthquake.

A passage from Van Reynegom’s 1887 “Historical Sketch” gives a vivid neighborhood
snapshot that illustrates how, just as today, St. John’s was always in a “mulit-use” pocket
of the north Mission, at an intersection of contrasting and colliding worlds:

It was about the time the church was built [1862] that Mr. Woodward gave his residence and started what are popularly known as Woodward’s Gardens [1866-91], with a menagerie appurtenant, and worshipers in the church are still occasionally disturbed in their worship by the roar of the lion or the laugh of the hyena, but in the early days of the church, in the midst of the morning service, a band would play all kinds of music – except devotional — in the plot of land immediately adjoining the church on the north. It is but just to Mr. Woodward to say that as soon as he was notified of this cause of disturbance to the congregation he stopped all band playing on his premises until after morning service.

One cannot think of the past history of St. John’s without associating with it the old acid words, of which the remains are still visible. They were to the windward of the church and the suffocating fumes and disagreeable odor therefrom were very distressing during divine service, catching the breath of the members of the congregation, many of whom were greatly distressed by the noxious gases evolved, which caused them to incessantly cough while worshipping. Expostulations against running the works during Sunday were in vain and it was not until 1880 or 1881 that the indignation of the residents of the Mission reached such a pitch that the Board of Supervisors declared the works a nuisance, and the plant and machinery were taken across the bay.

Within just 30 years of its founding, St. John’s had become a large and prosperous parish. During this early “golden age,” St. John’s played a key role, led by Rev. Brotherton, in founding St. Luke’s Hospital (1871) and provided financial and spiritual support to many institutions within the parish bounds, including the City and County Hospital, the Poor House, and the Protestant Episcopal Old Ladies Home. Another early rector, the Rev. Dr. E.B. Spalding, brought the Trinity School, a distinguished boys’ school, to St. John’s parish in 1881 and ran it for 20 years. In 1882, the Irving Institute, a fashionable girls’ school, was established under St. John’s auspices at Valencia and Hill Streets.

  
The Rev. Dr. E.B. Spalding, an early rector of St. John’s. Holy Innocents, founded as a mission chapel by St. John’s in 1883. Today it is an independent parish serving Noe Valley. An early parish outing, c. 1890s

St. John’s also built three satellite “mission” chapels to accommodate outlying worshipers and Sunday school attendees: Holy Innocents (1883) at Fair Oaks and 26th Streets, now an independent parish serving primarily Noe Valley; Good Shepherd (1887) at 17th and Noe Streets; and Epiphany (1897) at Potrero Avenue and 24th Street. “Urban legend” has it that they were built to be the churches for the servants of St. John’s wealthier members, but we can find no evidence of that in church documents. Rather, it seems that the chapels were built in part with families with small children in mind, so they would not have to make a longer journey to 15th and Julian, and possibly also to ward off others from establishing new parishes within what St. John’s regarded as its purview. (The original parish bounds, San Francisco’s former 11th ward, encompassed a large geographical area comprising the southern edge of what we now know as SOMA, the Mission, Noe Valley, the Castro, Eureka Valley, Glen Park, and then mostly uninhabited areas to the south and west, bounded by Ocean House and Lincoln Roads.) Early parish documents also make clear that the donor of the land for Holy Innocents had originally wanted the southern-lying chapel to be on the grounds of St. Luke’s Hospital, for the use of staff, patients, and their families.

St. John’s II, c. 1891

As the city boomed and the Mission became a highly desirable residential neighborhood, St. John’s continued to expand. It had become something of a “society parish,” home to leading businessmen, judges, and James “Sunny Jim” Rolph, eventual mayor of San Francisco and governor of California. Dr. Spalding inaugurated a building campaign to construct a cathedral-sized church. It was completed in 1891 at a cost of $57,000, leaving the parish in considerable debt. Several times larger than the earlier church, it seated 700 for regular services but could accommodate as many as 1,500 for special occasions. There was an organ chamber, an underground crypt, a green slate roof, a new rectory, and turrets with spiral staircases.

Criticism mounted nearly as high as the debt. “Great freedom has been taken by the architect,” noted a national architectural journal in reference to the exuberant, Byzantine style; the building had “a beauty all its own,” said The Pacific Churchman. Soon St. John’s earned the nickname “St. Rufus” (or variously, “St. Roofus”) for its predominate architectural feature, and was regarded in some corners as a flamboyant example of Gilded Age excess. Many parishioners, apparently aghast at the design and the final bill, began to drift away. The parish, which was already supporting numerous charitable enterprises, plunged into debt. Dr. Spalding suffered a breakdown in 1900 and was replaced by the Rev. Louis Sanford. For the next six years Sanford worked to restore parish morale and finances.



St. John’s II following the 1906 earthquake

The 1906 Earthquake
But then the Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906 struck, and the second St. John's building was destroyed in its aftermath. A 1950s history of the parish stated that the edifice had been dynamited to serve as a firebreak to stem the post-quake fires raging from the north and northeast, which tore a wide swath through the Mission, stopping eventually at 20th and Dolores Streets. (Rumors also flew that vestryman “Sunny Jim” Rolph, who played a prominent role in organizing relief efforts in the Mission, had lobbied City Hall to blow up the church with the goal of clearing the church’s debt.) A combination of photographic evidence and eyewitness accounts suggest instead that “St. Rufus” burned while standing.

One form of historic evidence comes from written accounts. The diocesan newsletter, then called The Pacific Churchman, offered a detailed report of affected parishes in its June, 1906 issue. The anonymous author of the St. John's entry provided a surprisingly detailed account of church activities following the earthquake, including an hour-by-hour report of events on the morning of Thursday the 19th. The close familiarity with movements of the ministers suggest that it was a church staff member who wrote the account. Any agreement to destroy the building purposefully would have included consultation with the staff, and yet the Pacific Churchman article makes no mention of explosives beyond a statement that their use had been suggested at one point. The account also mentions an eyewitness report that the church roof was on fire at 2 p.m. that day. The timing is consistent with fire chief reports that the conflagration destroyed the North Mission area that afternoon. If St. John's had been brought down in advance, the roof would not have been intact by the time the fire reached it. Finally, no original documents have been found that mention use of explosives on 15th or Julian Streets.

The second type of evidence is photographic. Many photos were taken of the church soon after the fire, and from many angles. The exterior masonry walls remain while the roof, glass, and all wooden elements are gone. Smoke stains emanating from window holes indicate clearly that the fire crossed the property. It would have been difficult to bring down the building without blasting some parts of the exterior, and yet photographs show that the exterior walls were intact after the fire.

There are still two ways in which explosives could have played a role. Eyewitnesses, including chiefs of several fire stations, noted how the inept use of dynamite, gunpowder, and other explosives often served to spread the fire. There are individual accounts that buildings on Mission Street within one to three blocks of St. John's were brought down for use as firebreaks. The resulting plumes of embers could have spread the fire to St. John's. Second, explosives were often used to bring down the masonry walls left intact by the fire. The walls of St. John's and other edifices needed to be removed quickly to allow rebuilding and to avoid the danger of a sudden collapse. While no direct evidence has been uncovered that St. John's was dynamited for this purpose, in all likelihood explosives were employed due to the sturdiness and size of the walls left standing. Thus it may well be true that “St. John's was dynamited after the earthquake,” but to prepare for rebuilding rather than to serve as a firebreak.

In any event, in late April 1906, St. John’s lay in ruins, like much of the rest of San Francisco. For the next four years, Sunday services were held in a shack on the church grounds amidst the rubble, some of which can still be seen in St. John’s basement.

 
St. John’s III today; St. John’s III, interior

St. John’s after the 1906 Earthquake
There was enough money (from insurance and donations from Episcopal churches across the country) to rebuild another church on the same spot. The new – and current –St. John’s, consecrated in 1910, was designed by Herbert Maggs and Ernest Coxhead, who modeled it on the parish church of St. Stephen’s, Norwich, England, in the light, soaring style known as Perpendicular Gothic or “Tudor Lantern.” With its sweeping height and numerous windows, it gives a sense of drawing worshipers upward and floods the space with light. A frequent reaction of first-time visitors when they St. John’s sanctuary, is, “Wow!” There is no building remotely like it in the Mission, and its garden is valued by neighbors for providing a rare bit of urban greenery in one of the grittier corners of San Francisco.

Both the third church building and parish itself would be on a more modest scale than “St. Roofus.” After the great earthquake, many parishioners were left homeless or destitute, and others moved away. Over time, the north Mission, no longer a popular residential neighborhood, sank into decline, best known for warehouses and flophouses, with something of a skid-row feel. A hulking armory was built just down the block.

Parish dance, c. 1922

St. John’s struggled with leadership, membership, and finances throughout the early decades of the twentieth century. Nevertheless, the church remained active in service, for example, holding an all-day event for “the relief and comfort of our soldiers” inOctober 1918, and continuing to raise funds for St. Luke’s Hospital and foreign relief. St.John’s also hosted a Boy Scout troupe and community social groups.

Even so, as the 1931 Pacific Churchman noted, “for many years St. John’s has been confronted with difficulties by virtue of a changing neighborhood population.” But a new rector turned that around to some degree, and in the early 1930s the parish attracted about 90 worshipers total on Sundays, recording 300 for Easter 1932. From 1934 until the early 1940s. St. John’s attendance again declined to around 40, and money was scarce. The parish made do with lay readers and no rector. Keeping the red doors on Julian Street open during the Depression and war years was no mean feat. Building repairs were neglected, and the maintenance contract for the organ was voided. The Great Depression and World War II continued to change the neighborhood, but the church was never closed.

With the coming of a new rector, the Rev. John Furlong, in 1947, a period of growth and renewed activity followed, with attendance back up to around 90 and 330 for Easter. These numbers held strong through the 1950s, with the Rev. Vern Swartzfarger having a particularly good impact through his “St. John’s Kids World,” a weekly Sunday evening happening where 150 local children “worship and play together, regardless of race, color, and creed.”

St. John’s Revival
But by 1961, St. John’s had attracted the concern of the bishop. The diocese was facing an historic failure south of Market Street, an area where one-third of San Francisco’s population resided. “Here Protestantism is dying,” an internal report concluded, and St.John’s was regarded as the most serious “real estate problem in the Deanery,” in desperate need of $25,000 “to keep the weather out. . . . It is, in modern planning, rather badly located in a residential block which is on the edge of a semi-industrial zone.” At the same time, the counter-culture movements of the 1960s took hold in the city and across the country, leading to a decline in church attendance nationally.

In 1968, with only 11 members, St. John’s lost official parish status. Bishop Kilmer Myers promised that the church would not be closed if the people proved themselves committed to and capable of doing useful service in the community.

St. John’s became part of the Diocesan Department of Urban and New Ministries, and in
1970 the Rev. Winston Ching was appointed vicar. Under Rev. Ching, the shape of worship at St. John’s changed. At a time more noted for folk masses, St. John’s went against the grain and instituted a more “High Church” style of worship that it has maintained until the present day. The parish hall was rented to the city as a residential alcohol rehabilitation treatment center. The church space was rented to a Head Start kindergarten program, and St. John’s was designated as a site for alternative community service for those who opposed serving in the Vietnam War. Over the next several years, dozens of conscientious objectors put their skills to good use at the church.

In 1971, Rev. Ching convened a group of members and other concerned people to form
St. John’s Educational Thresholds Center, a tutoring and language-training program geared toward the children of the neighborhood. “St. John’s ETC,” originally housed at St. John’s, was to become its own 501(c)3 and is now quartered around the corner on 16th Street. (Parish members continue to be involved as board members and tutors, and the parish makes an annual financial contribution to the center.) By 1973, parish membership was at 63. Rev. Ching’s acceptance of LGBT people also had earned St.John’s a reputation for diversity and tolerance.

Even the destruction of the parish hall and rectory by an arsonist’s fire in 1974 could not reverse the new momentum and enthusiasm. The charred remains were turned into a garden. The next rector, the Rev. James Brown, continued to reach out to the gay community, and built a reputation of St. John’s as a place of refuge and prayer for LGBT people and their friends and families.

By 1976, parish membership had grown to 110, and by 1977, St. John’s was readmitted to parish status in the Diocese. The clergy and laity of St. John’s also became increasingly prominent in the leadership of both church and socio-political organizations and projects during the 1970s and early 1980s.

But as the church continued to expand its spiritual and social endeavors, it faced a new, unprecedented challenge: the emerging AIDS crisis. A large number of parish members and friends were felled by HIV and AIDS. During the early years of the epidemic, under the leadership of the Rev. John “Jack” Eastwood, St. John’s provided a spiritual home as well as physical care and a sense of family to scores of gay men, many of whom had been disowned by their own families and churches. Funerals were held on average once a month through the mid-1980s, and the cremains of many of those men who found a home at the corner of Julian and 15th are buried in the church’s peaceful garden.

In a letter to mark St. John’s 130th anniversary in 1987, then Bishop William Swing delivered a powerful tribute. “I know of no other congregation through the years that has been plagued by such an unending list of calamities. Yet this congregation has proven to be tough in the very best sense of that word. Tough when nature has gone awry. Tough when epidemics have brought a scourge. Tough in the midst of serving the community. Tough like Jesus Christ in his passion.”

By 1994, when the Rev. David Norgard arrived as rector, the church was again facing crisis. Membership had fallen to 40, and the 84-year-old building was in terrible physical shape, with a leaking roof and unsound floors and walls. But under Rev. Norgard the parish grew again and pulled together for its “Standing Strong” campaign, raising hundreds of thousands of dollars to restore St. John’s, which was rededicated in 1999. The Rev. Duane Sisson served as interim rector in 1999 and 2000 following the departure of David Norgard. He was deeply admired, and many parishioners wished for him to stay. The interim rector contract prevented it, however, and soon he moved on. A second interim rector, Rick Adamson, served for a shorter time in late 2000 and early 2001.

St. John’s would faced another test from late 2002 to early 2003, when it was torn apart by controversy surrounding the Divine Rhythm Society, a group of post-Christian seekers that held all-night dances at the church, and the rector Kevin Pearson, who aligned himself closely with it. Rev. Pearson resigned, but during this time of conflict Sunday attendance dropped sharply, parish savings were depleted, and remaining parishioners were left feeling hurt and confused.

The next 18 months were devoted largely to recovering from this painful episode. Priest Associate Richard Smith preached regularly for several months, followed by the interim rectorship of the Rev. Canon David Forbes, who continues to serve as a priest associate at St. John’s. Through personal warmth and carefully wrought sermons, they guided the parish toward reconciliation and recovery. The Rev. Forbes had agreed to a four-month term but generously stayed on for five more as the parish searched for a new rector.

The Rt. Rev. Marc Handley Andrus presiding at St. John’s 150th anniversary mass, Nov. 2007

St. John’s Today
In 2004, the parish called the Rev. John Kirkley, associate vicar at Holy Innocents. After 18 months as long-term interim rector, the Vestry voted unanimously to call Kirkley to a permanent rectorship, and he accepted. His tenure has been marked by a return to parish cohesion, growth in membership, and a renewed focus on evangelism and ministry. It was in this spirit of joy and renewal that St. John’s celebrated its 150th anniversary on November 18, 2007, with the Rt. Rev. Marc Handley Andrus, Bishop of California, presiding. The nave was packed with St. John’s members and alumni, many of who had come from around the country to mark this milestone in a church that has meant so much to so many people.

A signal of St. John’s recovery has been a renewed interest in missions. Church members continue to volunteer time and money to St. John's Educational Thresholds Center and Martin de Porres House of Hospitality, both of which serve low-income residents of the Mission and other neighborhoods. Parishioner Bonita Palmer, a staff physician at St. Luke's Hospital, has become a major figure in the public effort to preserve inpatient care at the facility.

A new mission was born in 2002: a Thursday evening dinner known as the Warm Spot. Parishioner Michael Music prepared a wholesome meal, nearly always featuring a soup from his vast repertoire, while the Rev. Edward Wright welcomed guests and led the opening prayer. The original focus was to build the parish community during a time of dissension. Later the emphasis changed to serving the neighborhood, and the dinners were opened to all comers. Attendance eventually averaged more than 50 diners who came for food, fellowship, and healing prayer. Save for a short hiatus they continued for more than three years. As Wright has noted, the Warm Spot provided a rare opportunity for St. John's members to meet and learn about our neighbors.

The parish has felt an increasing call to international missions. El Porvenir, a nonprofit that sustains water-related development projects in Nicaragua, was founded in 1990 by St. John's members, former members, and friends. The parish contributes a modest amount annually, and in 2007 a group of eight parishioners visited project sites. An exciting new mission is the support of the Anglican Diocese of El Salvador. Its bishop lost support from conservative American congregations when he attended the consecration of Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire. St. John's, in alliance with other San Francisco parishes, is helping to fill the gap. The newest area of international mission is the support of gay and lesbian Anglicans in countries where they face persecution. The Rev. Tracy Longacre, a deacon and former member of St. John's, has performed field work in Uganda and Cameroon for this purpose since 2005. In 2007 the parish hosted Davis MacIyalla, a gay Anglican leader from Nigeria, and a few months later rector John Kirkely traveled to Uganda to meet with gay Anglicans who are pressing for greater acceptance.

The international missions have brought a fresh sense of excitement and purpose. There is a palpable feeling that the Spirit is leading us and that new opportunities await. As the tiny mustard seed can become a tree, so St. John's seeks to be mighty in effect despite its modest size.

In the past three years, average Sunday attendance has increased and the number of children, an important corollary to congregational growth, has increased to around 10% of average Sunday attendance. In 2003, the church instituted Godly Play, a Montessori-based educational program held before with the Sunday service.

St. John’s clergy present and past gather at the 150th celebration

For many years, St. John’s has been known for sending a disproportionately large number of parishioners to seminary, and the call to ordained and lay religious life continues to be strong. In recent years, nine parishioners have taken important steps in these ministries. Four have been ordained as priests, one of them now a priest associate at St. John's, and a fifth is a postulant for holy orders. One person was ordained into the permanent deaconate, and three more have taken or will soon take vows in lay religious communities. Combined with the many priest associates, retired ministers, and other parishioners who have seminary training, they continue to enrich our understanding and practice of liturgy and music.

In the coming years, St. John’s will continue to work to strengthen its membership and financial pictures, and explore potential new work in the neighborhood and around the globe. While a great number of St. John’s members continue to work at and/or volunteer for non-profit institutions throughout San Francisco and the Bay Area, the church itself provides a kitchen for Dolores Street Community Services to cook meals for its Latino men’s shelter and hosts several AA/NA meetings throughout the week. We are exploring ways we can partner in ministry with our neighboring parishes Holy Innocents, St. Aidan’s, and St. Gregory’s, which began by joining together to support the church in El Salvador, and we are exploring the possibility of hosting a food pantry and partnering with the Diocese to develop Spanish-language ministry in our North Mission neighborhood.

Photos: B. Pethoud, K. Leibenath.
Historical materials courtesy of Mattie Scott and Charlie Weigle, great, great-grandson of F.W. Van Reynegom.