Sundays at 10:15ish
Liturgy includes music, prayer, meditation, communion, and a conversational time related to the week’s Lectionary text and our weekly podcast. Podcast episodes are available every Saturday on our website and wherever you listen to podcasts! Our Sunday liturgy is casual and families can be together during service. There’s space for kids to color, read, and play and also a cozy
library if parents need a private space to take a little one during the service. ABOUT
Mission Hills is committed to creating radically inclusive spaces of belonging, healing, and grace. In this, we hope to make sure there is no question in what we mean by “all are welcome at the table.”
Women in ministry
Mission Hills is egalitarian and fully supports the leadership and ordination of women and gender non-conforming folks in accordance with our understanding of the “priesthood of all believers.”
LGBTQIA+ in ministry
Mission Hills practices the full affirmation and inclusion of LGBTQ+ folks in membership, leadership, ordination, and marriage. We celebrate the gifting of the Holy Spirit to continue carrying out the work of Love in our world. We seek to be a space where all can experience rest and peace knowing that all persons, regardless of identity, can experience true belonging here. Commitment to anti-racism
Mission Hills is committed to being a pro-reconciling/anti-racist church. Christ calls us to dismantle white supremacy and systemic racism and advocate for justice in our community and world. As a community, we are committed to pursuing anti-racism not as an option but as an essential. We are committed to supporting anti-racism work in our own community, families, and as part of the greater Los Angeles area. We commit to acting justly within our structure, policies, and activism involvement. We recognize that stepping into brave space means that sometimes we will misstep, but we continue to push forward in creating space for true belonging. As part of our commitment to anti-racism, we strive to:
- Pursue and protect the right to peaceful protest.
- Continue understanding our own role in our current system.
- Speak out against injustice and racial profiling.
- Speak for reform of unjust healthcare, housing, and economic policies, and the criminal justice and legal systems that have oppressed and exploited people of color while protecting and privileging white people.
- Reflect the fullness of the Divine by pursuing trauma-informed space. As a community, we are called into brave space and continue to be in conversation with one another about this work. Books that have guided our conversations
The Cross and the Lynching Tree by James Cone
Anxious to Talk About It by Carolyn B. Helsel
How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
VALUES
We value inclusive and affirming faith, not confining and judgmental. We value belonging and community, not church consumption or attendance. We value compassion, leading us to justice and healing. We value doubts and questions as essential to faith, not in opposition to faith. We value finding beauty in creative arts, nature, and mystery. We value contemplation, wisdom, and curiosity above belief and doctrine. We value serving people and our planet because through love we experience Christ. We value a radical embrace of the Christian wisdom tradition and the pursuit of authentic spirituality for a post-Christian future. WEEKLY GATHERINGS
Sundays - Liturgy at 10:15ish
Mondays - Coffeehouse Hours from 10 am (contact for availability)
STAFF
RYAN
Ryan Pryor is the lead pastor at Mission Hills. Ryan is a graduate of Fuller Theological Seminary, receiving a Master of Arts in Theology with an emphasis in art & culture in 2015. Ryan graduated from Baylor University in 2010 with a Bachelor of Arts in Religion and a minor in International Studies. Ryan has served in ministries in Texas, Virginia, Hawaii, and California and is an ordained minister with standing in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). Ryan and Andrea now call Los Angeles home and have a pandemic cat named Birdie! KELLY
Kelly Ravenscraft is the Worship and Arts Director at Mission Hills. She is a graduate of Loyola University Chicago with a B.A. in International Studies and Sociology and Chicago Theological Seminary with a Master of Divinity. She is under care of the Pacific Southwest Region of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) as she pursues ordination. She is a dog mom to Kuzco who you may find playing in the sanctuary after service. PARTNERS
Disciples
Disciples AllianceQ
Green Chalice Environmental Certified
Here are a few readings that often guide our gatherings together. WELCOME READING
May we create brave space for each other because we recognize that this will be a vulnerable and imperfect gathering. We are invited
to be honest,
to not take ourselves too seriously,
to respect all,
to find peace,
to be challenged,
and to experience love,
in order that we may be transformed by an encounter with grace to go into our weeks and live well. COMMUNION READING
In the Eucharist, we remember the suffering of Christ. The bread his broken body and the wine, his blood poured out. In the mystery of communion, we practice uniting ourselves with Christ who suffered at the hands of Empire. Both grain and grapes are crushed and broken and become something new together. We who take the bread and wine become one with the suffering of Christ as he becomes one with ours. Together, we become the living body of Christ. We pray as we take the elements that we would be become the body of Christ, broken and poured out in love for our world. In this place we pray for change, to become new vessels, full of courage, wisdom, hope and love. May we become a new people, changed, healed, grown strong and hopeful by God and one another’s love. And we remember, how in the company of friends, enemies, and strangers alike, Jesus took bread, gave thanks, broke it, and shared it with everyone saying:
“Take, eat, this is my body extended to all.”
Likewise, he took the cup, blessed it, and shared it saying:
“Drink this – all of you - a new agreement for a divine way of life. As often as you gather, do this, remember this covenant and remember me." Whether we eat or don’t eat, whether we drink or don’t drink, we are welcome come out to new life. BENEDICTION
As we approach this week,
may we love God,
embrace beauty,
and live life to the fullest. Amen.
