Re: “Final Candidates Forum – Oh, It’s Nothing”
Unfazed that an anticipated audience missed roll call for a sort-of City Council candidates forum last evening, Pastor Adam Edgerly seamlessly segued into conducting video interviews.
At Sunday morning services – two days before the election — members of the Newsong LA Covenant Church, Fox Hills, will see what three candidates say about religion.
Pastor Edgerly led the four candidates who did show up – Scott Wyant, Goran Eriksson, Marcus Tiggs and Thomas Small – onto a platform at the front of the 13-year-old Culver City church.
He set the stage for them.
“The responsiveness of all of you, coming out on very short notice, speaks to your character and your desire to serve,” the pastor said.
Because God Said So
Alluding to a Bible-based call to civic duty, Pastor Edgerly said that “we believe God is saying, ‘Wherever you live, you need to seek the welfare of that city. That is how you are going to do well, if that city does well.’”
Speaking for himself, the young minister said that “as a Christian, I have a responsibility to pray for my leaders and to thank God for you.”
Pastor Edgerly said he did not know the religious backgrounds of the four men on the platform. “My faith tells me God sent you take care of our city.”
What, he asked Messrs. Small, Eriksson, Tiggs and Wyant, “can we do to serve you?”
When Pastor Edgerly asked the candidates to introduce themselves, Mr. Small was the first and most succinct — name, rank and happy to be there.
The rest chose a religious angle, given their presence in a church.
“I was raised Episcopalian,” Mr. Wyant said. “My wife and my daughter both are Jewish. My wife was raised that way. My daughter was bat mitzvah’d.
“Like many people in Southern California,” he said, the Wyants are a two-religion family. Judaism has a significant holiday nearly every month of the year, and Mr. Wyant said his daughter celebrates each of them.”
Moral Boost Needed
As for what the Newsong LA Covenant Church can do for the candidates, Mr. Wyant said that “having any moral dimension in any election is a bonus.”
He said “the biggest thing is to convince people to vote.
“The first thing is to vote – 1A is to vote for me.”
A native of Sweden, Mr. Eriksson said he was baptized in the Swedish Lutheran church.
He proudly explained that his two sons attended Loyola, a traditional Catholic high school. “I really am impressed by the school because they taught many Judeo-Christian values that our society is based on,” Mr. Eriksson. “This was a valuable experience for my sons.”
He stressed the two-tiered small-town obligation not only of voting “but being engaged after the election. Mr. Eriksson said it would be crucial for voters to join a neighborhood association or one of the service clubs and continue to make a contribution.
“Then you start to learn how the city works, meet the people and be effective.
“You are not done after you vote. We all have a shared responsibility.”
Mr. Tiggs introduced himself as a “second-generation Roman Catholic. I have a late uncle who was a priest. I go to St. Augustine’s Church. I go to Mass on Sunday and Mass on Wednesday.
“This campaign brought me to the King Fahad Mosque a couple times,” Mr. Tiggs said. “I went to Temple Akiba and spoke with Rabbi Shapiro. And I am here.
“What I find is that while I don’t practice Islam and I am not Jewish, going into a house of worship, you feel something in your heart.
“When I was in the King Fahad Mosque and they were praying,” Mr. Tiggs said, “I didn’t understand a lot of it. But you just feel something.
“I look at faith as being important. At the same time, I would not push my faith onto anyone.”
