Churchgoers defied stay-at-home order in California. So the landlord locked them out
Cross Culture Christian Center in California continued to meet for services even after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a stay-at-home order to slow the spread of the coronavirus on March 19, county officials said.
Then their landlord intervened.
When congregants and their pastor arrived on Palm Sunday, media outlets report they found new locks on the doors to the building they lease in Lodi, about 40miles south of Sacramento.
“We were advised that the building has been closed down to us, that the locks have been changed,” Pastor Jon Duncan told KCRA.
Cross Culture Christian Center — a “small evangelical church” — was using space at Bethel Open Bible Church for their services, the Los Angeles Times reported. It was church officials who changed the locks on the building, Lodi Police Lt. Michael Manetti told the L.A. Times.
According to its Facebook page, Bethel Open Bible stopped holding in-person services on March 15.
“It’s their property and they are ultimately responsible for it, (they) did have the locks changed,”Manetti said of Bethel church, according to KCRA.
Duncan had remained adamant that Cross Culture Christian Center continue holding services after Newsom ordered residents to stay home and avoid nonessential travel, KTXL reported.
“We are going to meet as often as we can meet and we do believe that this right is protected by the First Amendment and should be considered essential,” Duncan told KTXL on April 1.
Two days later, the public health director for San Joaquin County sent Bethel Open Bible Church a warning letter.
“On March 29, the City of Lodi reported to the County Public Health Officer that your tenant, Cross Culture Community Church, was continuing to use your facility for public assembly, and that Cross Culture Community Church was aware of the county order and intended to continue to meet in violation of the order,” the letter states.
Officials told the church its building and parking lot were not considered “essential critical infrastructure” under the governor’s order. Willful neglect of that order, the letter continued, could result in a misdemeanor.
On Sunday morning, four police officers met with Duncan before the service to give him a copy of the officials’ order, The Sacramento Bee reported.
He opted to call it off after a 10-minute discussion and proceeded to “hand out copies of his sermon and pray briefly with individual congregants as they arrived in their cars,” according to The Bee.
This story was originally published April 7, 2020 at 1:27 PM with the headline "Churchgoers defied stay-at-home order in California. So the landlord locked them out."
