About Us
St. Cuthbert's Episcopal Church is a diverse congregation in East Oakland between Mills College and the Oakland Zoo, on Mountain Blvd., off Rt. 580 at the Keller Ave exit. We're an eclectic bunch, a community where, as a priest once said about us, "every single person is a CHARACTER!"
Within our small gathering of about 20 people each Sunday, we have people born and raised in California and people born and raised all over the U.S. and in the Caribbean islands, white people and black people, wheelchair-bound and able-bodied, those who struggle with mental illness and homelessness, straight people and gay people, teachers, health care workers, and business-owners. You won't find a homogenous group of clones here! You don't have to be a certain way or look a certain way or act a certain way to be a part of the community at St. Cuthbert's: you are welcome to come in and be uniquely you, among a group of people all being uniquely themselves, and know you will be accepted for it.
What binds us together is our common desire to serve God in Christ, and to model our lives after him. That, and the fact that we like being part of a community that reflects the diversity of God's kingdom. Loving, joyful, inclusive, and creative, we seek to embody the message of 1 John 4:16: “God is love, and those who live in love, live in God and God in them.”
Within our small gathering of about 20 people each Sunday, we have people born and raised in California and people born and raised all over the U.S. and in the Caribbean islands, white people and black people, wheelchair-bound and able-bodied, those who struggle with mental illness and homelessness, straight people and gay people, teachers, health care workers, and business-owners. You won't find a homogenous group of clones here! You don't have to be a certain way or look a certain way or act a certain way to be a part of the community at St. Cuthbert's: you are welcome to come in and be uniquely you, among a group of people all being uniquely themselves, and know you will be accepted for it.
What binds us together is our common desire to serve God in Christ, and to model our lives after him. That, and the fact that we like being part of a community that reflects the diversity of God's kingdom. Loving, joyful, inclusive, and creative, we seek to embody the message of 1 John 4:16: “God is love, and those who live in love, live in God and God in them.”
Making lunches for Sacred Space
We're bound together by our common worship and common service. We're a giving community, always looking for ways to address needs in our area. We make bag lunches once a month (pictured above) for Sacred Space, an outdoor church community for homeless people in the Bay Area. One of our members delivers these lunches to Sacred Space's Hayward location (Cannery Park) and distributes them to the community gathered there. Much more than just a meal distribution program, Sacred Space provides a worshipping community for those who find it difficult to enter a traditional church building or service, for a variety of reasons. Rather than waiting for people to come to us, we take the church to them.
We also sponsor a toy drive every Christmas season for children with cancer and AIDS, and generously support the work our fellow parishioners are doing in their ministry in the world. This news clip shows an example of us doing just that: both people interviewed in this video are parishioners at St. Cuthbert's and know each other through their connection at church... which led to this community outreach.
We care deeply about social justice. We have partnered with Act for Racial Justice, a group of residents in the neighborhood around the church who joined together to address racial prejudice and profiling in our neighborhood. We've hosted a voters' forum to educate people on the issues on the ballot and their potential impact on racial justice, hosted community organizing meetings, and recently placed a banner on the outside of the church that says "Immigrants and Refugees Welcome." All of these things we do out of our understanding of how the Gospel of Jesus Christ calls us to love unconditionally and work for justice for all people.
Below is a six minute slideshow of various photos over a period of time from the mid 1990s through the mid-2000s that will give you a sense of the "feel" and flavor of our community:
