ITEMS OF INTEREST August 16, 2010 Issue

ITEMS OF INTEREST

with contributions from Jeremy Hay

[A] LOW-CEILINGED, RECTANGULAR room in the Steele Lane Community Center [in Santa Rosa, California] is without any religious iconography or symbols. It has a mottled-blue carpet and a fireplace, a door that opens onto the community center's parking lot, and, at the rear, an industrial kitchen with a metal accordion gate.

Every Sunday, it is home to Metro Church, one of seven churches that rent space in Santa Rosa community centers and are part of a growing flock of Sonoma County congregations that have started their churches from the ground up. These religious entrepreneurs, often beginning with two or three members, find space in public buildings, warehouse districts and office parks, established churches and downtown storefronts....

Some of the churches are nondenominational, like Christ the Healer, which convenes down the hall from Metro at the Steele Lane Center and emphasizes healing through prayer, and New Birth Community Church, which meets at the Bennett Valley Senior Center.

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