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There are few pipe organs in the world that have a nickname, a feminine pronoun and a Facebook fan page. The Hazel Wright organ — just “Hazel,” to her admirers — was removed piece by piece in 2013 from Christ Cathedral’s shimmering sanctuary in Southern California’s Orange County, and shipped to Italy for repair. At the time, the fifth-largest pipe organ in the world was suffering from an infestation of bugs. Its pipes were melted, its trumpets corroded. Nearly a decade and $3 million later, Hazel is back in the fully remodeled sanctuary, and heavenly chords from her pipes once...

When the Rev. Robert H. Schuller decided in the mid-1970s that his congregation was outgrowing the drive-in, low-slung Garden Grove church that Richard Neutra had designed for him 15 years earlier within earshot of Interstate 5, and that he needed a purpose-built cathedral to accommodate his increasingly popular “Hour of Power” televised sermons, he flew to New York to visit the architecture firm run by Philip Johnson and John Burgee. On the face of it, Schuller and Johnson were a very strange match, the self-made Orange County televangelist and the smoothly moneyed New York architect who was also an atheist...

From the moment he climbed atop a drive-in theater snack bar to preach to families in their automobiles, Robert Schuller established himself as a different sort of clergyman ... At its peak, his Orange County-based ministry operated the Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove and the "Hour of Power" television program, which put Schuller's grinning face and folksy humor before an estimated 20 million viewers a week. But Schuller lived long enough to see the empire crumble. Amid acrimonious family squabbling, his church filed for bankruptcy in 2010 ... "The private Schuller – particularly among strangers but even around his faithful...

Just hours after his former church congregation issued a call for prayer for his health, family members of the influential Rev. Robert H. Schuller has announced his death at the age of 88.The Associated Press reported via Twitter just at 10:23 a.m. ET that Carol Schuller Milner, Schuller's daughter, had reported his death.Schuller's grandson, who has been leading the church founded by former members of the Crystal Cathedral congregation since 2013, confirmed his passing via Twitter, writing: "My Grandfather Robert H. Schuller passed this morning into eternal life with Christ."Schuller, who lost his wife, Arvella Schuller, in Feb. 2014, passed away...

ARTESIA, Calif. (AP) — The Rev. Robert H. Schuller, the Southern California televangelist and author who beamed his upbeat messages on faith and redemption to millions from his landmark Crystal Cathedral only to see his empire crumble in his waning years, has died. He was 88. Schuller died early Thursday at a care facility in Artesia, daughter Carol Schuller Milner said. He was diagnosed with terminal esophageal cancer in 2013. Schuller, who preached in a flowing purple robe and outsized aviator glasses, led an evangelical Protestant ministry that was a product of modern technology. He and his late wife, Arvella,...

Some time ago, as part of the media buzz surrounding the purchase of the Crystal Cathedral, the Catholic Diocese of Orange opened the floor to online suggestions as to what the new church should be named. I offered that it should be titled the Cathedral of the Transfiguration; after all, the feast of the Transfiguration is traditionally the patronal festival for churches dedicated to Our Lord, and its suggestions of illumination, splendor, and above all, a glimpse of Heaven afforded through physical change, seemed perfectly suited to the project, even not without a bit of reverent wit. The name chosen,...

“America loves success stories.” This is how a 1983 admiring profile of the famed Robert Harold Schuller began. And back in 1983 “Bob” Schuller, as his friends called him, was certainly successful. The son of pious Dutch Reformed parents, Schuller was born on a farm in Sioux County, Iowa, in 1926. That was one year before Sinclair Lewis published Elmer Gantry, a satirical novel about a ne’er-do-well preacher from Kansas. Though Schuller would match Gantry in exuberance and flamboyant style, he was no charlatan. Educated at his denomination’s flagship schools, Hope College and Western Theological Seminary, Schuller was already a...

Once the symbol of a congregation founded by Robert Schuller, the cathedral is now part of a church with rites and traditions that span centuries.Towering like the Emerald City, the cathedral formerly known as Crystal sits at what might be Orange County's nucleus, a trinity of confluencing freeways, the Angels and Ducks stadium and a glimpse of a sacred place of a different kind — Disneyland From that gleaming sanctuary, evangelist Robert Schuller delivered sermons that were beamed to television sets around the world. His ministry became synonymous with the megachurch, designed so the light and the breeze could stream...

The former senior pastor of the Crystal Cathedral, Robert A. Schuller, has announced that he will default on his home in Laguna Beach, Calif., after unsuccessful attempts to sell the home before its Nov. 2 foreclosure date. "I'm short-selling my house. I have more loans than I can sell the house for," Schuller said in a recent interview with the Orange County Register. "The house will not go into foreclosure. It will be a short sale," Schuller said, adding: "I can't afford the house as I once could." Schuller, who is the son of the Crystal Cathedral's founder, the Rev....

Three miles from Disneyland there is another famous theme park, which proclaims itself as “America’s Television Church.” The Crystal Cathedral, perhaps the first mega-church in the United States, is about to undergo conversion classes so that it can finally get the cathedra and bishop it has always wanted. The Diocese of Orange, California, has purchased the thirty-one-acre property and its four buildings for $53 million, a steal even in this real estate market. Realizing that recent cathedrals built from scratch have cost upwards of $200 and $250 million on the West Coast, retrofitting sounds like a financially savvy move. However,...

The name Christ Cathedral was selected from 4,129 submissions received from around the world. Father Christopher H. Smith is named to the top post at the cathedral, which the diocese bought for $57.5 million.When Father Christopher H. Smith was a child, he'd peek through the eucalyptus trees in his grandparents' yard on Sunday mornings at the drive-in theater next door to watch a man give a sermon on the top of a tar-papered snack bar, the same place where he'd grab his popcorn on movie evenings. The man atop the snack bar was the Rev. Robert H. Schuller, preaching from...

Last Schullers Leave Crystal Cathedral Leadership by Steve Eastman, Faith Issues It was a possibility Dr. Robert Schuller may never thought of until recently. This past weekend he and his wife Arvella announced they were stepping down from the church's board. She put it this way, "We cannot continue to serve on the Board in what has become an adversarial and negative atmosphere, especially since it now seems that it will not be ending anytime soon." The two had been disputing with the board over alleged copyright infringement and back pay for services, tied to bankruptcy issues. This puts the...

On Sunday, the Hour of Power television show opened with characteristic optimism, encouraging people who needed a lift to watch the program. But when Senior Pastor Sheila Schuller Coleman began her sermon, she acknowledged that she doesn't always practice the positive thinking that she preaches. "For instance this past week, my attitude was a little down, a little negative," she told the congregation, "making life miserable for people around me, most of all moi, myself." Schuller Coleman is Robert Schuller's daughter, and she, along with the entire Schuller family, is cutting ties with the Crystal Cathedral. Robert Schuller founded the...

GARDEN GROVE (CBS) — The Rev. Robert H. Schuller and his wife, Arvella, have resigned from the board of the Crystal Cathedral, the mega-church he founded more than 55 years ago. Their resignations, announced Saturday “with great sadness,” come less than a week after three of their relatives – including a daughter – were ousted amid ongoing financial squabbles, declining donations and suspension of production on the church’s signature television program, “Hour of Power.” “We cannot continue to serve on the board in what has become an adversarial and negative atmosphere, especially since it now seems that it will not...

The Rev. Robert H. Schuller and his wife, Arvella, announced "with great sadness" their resignations Saturday from the Crystal Cathedral board of directors. "We cannot continue to serve on the Board in what has become an adversarial and negative atmosphere, especially since it now seems that it will not be ending anytime soon," Arvella Schuller was quoted as saying in a news release. Robert Schuller grew the ministry from a congregation that met in a drive-in theater in Orange in 1955 to a thriving megachurch that attracted thousands to its striking building in Garden Grove. Schuller's "Hour of Power" television...

The Diocese of Orange has closed on its purchase of the shimmering Crystal Cathedral and surrounding 31-acre grounds, putting the iconic building seen as a testament to televangelism in Catholic hands. The diocese said Friday that escrow proceedings had closed on its $57.5 million purchase of the property, which will become the site of a long-sought cathedral for Orange County’s nearly 1.3 million Catholics. ..“Our goal is to preserve an already cherished religious landmark and to enhance its worship use for Orange County Catholics and all people of faith who may be inspired by this wonderful, now Catholic, cathedral,” Bishop...

An email sent out to the Crystal Cathedral's congregation requested meals for founder Robert Schuller's wife, Arvella, who is sick with pneumonia. Crystal Cathderal Ministries, a glass-walled Orange County church known for its "Hour of Power" broadcasts, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Oct. 18. The Schullers, church administrators, have come under fire after court documents revealed they may have taken nearly $10 million from the church's endowment funds. The email sent by Pastor Jim Kok asked parishioners not to send cards, because church staff and the Schullers want to keep her illness "under the radar." "However, they would appreciate...

The bankrupt megachurch is to be sold to the Diocese of Orange.GARDEN GROVE – Crystal Cathedral's head pastor spoke optimistically about the future of her iconic megachurch at Sunday morning services, telling a congregation of about 400 that it was not too late to ask God to intervene and stop the church's impending sale to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange. Senior Pastor Sheila Schuller Coleman, the daughter of the church's founder, offered a prayer thanking God for "intentionally delaying" a miracle, and indicated that the bankrupt church would continue to pray and wait for God to reveal His final...

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange County, California is buying Robert Schuller's celebrated Protestant Crystal Cathedral megachurch for $57.5 million, the LA Times reports. The spacious, light-filled house of worship is a "a monument of 20th century modernist architecture," the Times writes.

SANTA ANA, Calif., Nov. 10 (UPI) -- The Roman Catholic diocese of Orange County has promised to honor Robert Schuller's legacy if it acquires his Crystal Cathedral in Southern California. A bankruptcy judge is scheduled to decide on the future of the complex at a hearing Monday, The Orange County Register reported. At a hearing Wednesday, a lawyer for the diocese said it was adding $1.8 million to its offer for the cathedral, bringing the total to $55.4 million. The cathedral board has said it would prefer an offer by Chapman University, an institution affiliated with the Disciples of Christ....