On religious liberty from Pasadena

Earlier this morning I forwarded you my letter to Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger. Kathryn is a moderate Republican surrounded by far far far left Democrats.California is in its second lock down. Throughout both lock downs Churches have not been allowed to meet throughout most of the state and where allowed, no singing was permitted by edict of the governor. In early opening stages several pastors have sought to use Los Angeles County Parks via permit to hold church, offering to enforce mask wearing, social distancing and preventing singing. Each of these has been told that the County of Los Angeles is not taking applications for groups to use parks.

Today a mass protest is planned for the Park down the street from my house, Charles White Park in Altadena. The protest will begin with a rally there and then will march from Altadena down Fair Oaks to Jackie Robinson Park in Pasadena where another longer rally will be held. Pasadena has also refused to discuss any parks use with Churches. I am confident no parade permit has been issued by either city and that BLM will be blocking intersections illegally with private automobiles as they did in the prior BLM protest a couple of weeks ago where they gathered in Loma Alta Park in Altadena and had a hour long rally and then marched down Lincoln Avenue chanting “Black lives Matter” “Defund the Police” They marched to Charles White Park where they had a almost five hour rally with well over 1000 people in attendance repeating chants and listening to amplified speeches. For that march they also used private automobiles illegally to block traffic. I assume because of this and the fact that not a single Sheriff’s car was present at the five hour long rally at Charles White Park that no permits for assembly in either park or for the march had been issued.

When News reporters asked Dr. Barbara Ferrer, LA County’s chief health officer, why protesters have been allowed to freely violate State and County Health decrees, she responded “People have a Constitutional Right to protest. Protesting is important. We can’t stop protesting because it’s in the Constitution.”  I couldn’t agree more. Equality is necessary for the Republic to function. The Constitution and the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights trump all else. The County may not, however pick and choose among speech it enjoys and deems important and speech it does not enjoy and does not deem important.

Since the County has refused to discuss granting permits for the worship of the one true G_d in parks, I must assume Christians and Jews will be allowed to use the parks for worship without permit, since after all Black Lives Matter and their associated front groups have been freely doing so with no restriction.

I anticipate of course that the Intolerant Stalinist lefties who run LA County  WILL respond to worshipers and will attempt to shut down worship and arrest pastors and worshipers. I am reaching out to your organization in the hopes that you all will agree to take any cases that may result from Christians and or Jews attempting to worship in Los Angeles County Parks on the same terms as Black Lives Matter have been allowed to use the parks for mass protests. This issue is literally the future of the American Church and if we will or will not have Chinese style government dominance and control over worship.

As an aside, throughout the shutdown Altadena’s Mosque has never closed and has had public worship and daily group prayer the entire time. I guess Muslims have Covid immunity?

Thank you for your consideration.

Steven S. Lamb