Faith never enters history in creedal formulas or doctrinal statements.  Throughout history, great affirmations and the faith they spawn emerged in living contexts and are incarnate in individual and social forms. 

The windows are what first draw many people to Northbrae.  How can a church still be a church and have the Buddha, Mohammed, and Lao-tzu in its stained glass windows? It is a novel approach – to base a church not on creeds, or doctrines, or a limited tradition of founders, but to open up consciousness to the breadth of humanity.  And to do so while still being a church.  Follow the links and explore our stained glass windows:

•  Altar “Rainbow” Window                                                                     

•  Moses - Noah and our Mythic Past

•  Buddha - Confuscius - Lao-tse - Isaiah 

•  Paul - Jesus - Plato - Socrates

•  Pastor Robinson - Luther - Francis of Assisi - Mohammed

•  Florence Nightingale - Emerson - Thomas Paine - Berkeley

•  Rauschenbusch - Jane Addams - George Washington Carver - Lincoln

•  W. F. Meyer – Frank S. Brush – Einstein – Mahatma Gandhi

•  Narthex “Worldview” Window

Concept Behind Our Windows – by Ron Sebring

There seems to be a concept or organizing principle behind our Torchbearer Windows along the north wall of the chapel.  Moving from the front of the sanctuary to the back, they move from global / general to local / particular.  They move from broad theory to practical application.  And they move from ancient to modern.  They do so in roughly four stages.                                                                            

(1) Noah, being a mythological and not a historical figure, seems to represent the nebulous inheritance we have of collective human wisdom.  The first string of Torchbearers emerging from that symbolic “rainbow” point represent the founders of world religions – Moses (Judaism), Lao-tsu (Taoism), Confucius (Confucianism), Buddha (Buddhism), Jesus and Paul (Christianity), Plato and Socrates (our Western Philosophical heritage), Mohammed (Islam).

(2) Then we have a string of Torchbearers who took the founding principles of world religions and applied them to broad social ideas and movements – Francis of Assisi, Martin Luther, Pastor Robinson, Bishop Berkeley, Thomas Paine, and Ralph Waldo Emerson.                                                                                                     [TOP]

(3)  The next string becomes more specific by applying them to social action in the midst of specific situations and social needs – Walter Rauschenbusch (who introduced the idea of the “Social Gospel”), Florence Nightingale, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington Carver, Jane Addams, Mahatma Gandhi, and Albert Einstein. 

(4) The final two windows bring it down to our local level, to our particular church – Frank Brush (our founder), and W.F. Meyer (significant contributing member).  Indeed, beside Frank Brush’s window is a small sign announcing “Northbrae Community Church.”  The progressive narrowing of focus from general to particular, global to local, ancient to modern seems to imply that the next step is for each of us to take the torch and move into our own world.     

Assuming such a concept invites both critique and appreciation.  The concept and research for the windows was the decision and contribution of the Cross family.  They left us with a wonderful gift.  It has been the organizing principle for Northbrae.  And too, the windows leave out a representative founder of Hinduism (Patanjali, for example) as well as indigenous religions (someone from Native American spirituality, perhaps).  Precedence for change was established when John Wesley was removed and replaced with Gandhi.

Introduction to Our Windows – by Erma Cross, wife of Rev. Cross

For over forty years, the people of Northbrae Church dreamed of a special place of worship.

Dr. Frank S. Brush was the first minister of the new church, and the activity building was built under his leadership.  Dr. Brush, by his tireless pastoral work, laid a fine membership foundation of dedicated men and women.  When Rev. Laurance L. Cross was called in 1924, he was able to build on this base of leadership and growing community enthusiasm.  By this time the need for a sanctuary was so pressing, we moved to the Oaks Theater for special services.  All available funds were needed for the ongoing program and for the effort to become independent, as a true community church.

The dream for a new sanctuary persisted and in 1944, a campaign was organized to raise the needed funds to build; but at that time, the confusion of war made us hesitate.  The sanctuary project was taken up again in 1949, and despite raising cost, it was decided at last to build.                                                                         [TOP]

Mr. Reginald Inwood, a church architect, was contacted.  When Mr. Cross told him we had limited funds but that we must make up for that with great beauty, he was delighted, for he too had dreamed of some day building a sanctuary unhampered by ancient tradition.  We visited some of Mr. Inwood’s other churches and we learned mostly “what not to do with an A-frame structure.”

Gradually our committee developed a new concept for a church interior – a single theme - “God’s Love for His World.”  This theme was suggested long ago in legend and in God’s Rainbow promise.  We sense it in the miracle of life, growth, and beauty that surrounds us in all nature.  The Rainbow Window is the initial statement of our sanctuary theme.

Hardest of all to depict was the upward reach of human nature and the gradual process of spiritual development.  The Procession of Torchbearers is the result of this difficult task.  Ancient history gives credit to an individual, but we know the individual builds on the values of the past, and on the best thinking of his contemporaries, as well as on his own ideas.

As we approached our own time the list of Torchbearers became longer and it was especially difficult to eliminate great scholars and dedicated leaders who have contribute to our understanding of Jesus’ teachings.  To illustrate this difficulty, after the sanctuary had been completed, a gentleman from India studied our Procession of Torchbearers and felt very hurt that modern India was not represented in the windows.  At once Mr. Cross directed the artist to redesign a spot and Mahatma Gandhi’s name was added.

So we come to the World Window.  As we go out from our worship together, we go as messengers to carry the Rainbow promise of “God’s Love for His World.”  The Procession of Torchbearers has no end. 

Artist                                                                                                         [TOP]

Dr. Jon Wallis of Pasadena created our stained glass windows.  He participated in creating the glasswork at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine and the Rockefeller-Riverside Church in New York.  At Northbrae Community Church, Dr. Wallis and Rev. Cross worked together to build the design and symbolism around our sanctuary themes.  The designers and craftsmen of the Wallis-Wiley Company crafted the three sets of windows in our sanctuary (The Rainbow Window, the Torchbearer Windows, and the World Window).