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Eaton Fire burns decades-old St. Mark's Church in Altadena

Altadena's 100-year-old St. Mark's Church burned in Eaton Fire
Altadena's 100-year-old St. Mark's Church burned in Eaton Fire 03:13

Amid the rubble from the thousands of Altadena homes burned during the Eaton Fire lies the remnants of a parish's decades-old house of worship.

"We have lost everything physical," Pastor Carri Patterson Grindon said. "All of our vestments, the things that clergy wear; all of the vessels we use to serve communion; most of our records."

Grindon, the Rector of St. Mark's Episcopal Church, is part of the community that began gathering generations ago, initially in 1906 as All Saints North Pasadena Mission, and again in 1914 as St. Mark's Parish. They opened their first church a year later and opened the now-charred sanctuary in 1948. From there, the community expanded its footprint with a meeting house, parish administration building, preschool and elementary school between 1958 and 1966. 

"Funerals there, weddings, baptisms — for decades and decades and decades," Grindon said. 

When the Eaton Fire started last week, Grindon evacuated her home with her family as flames consumed her backyard.

"We had not been told to evacuate, but the fire was in our backyard," she said.

She said she had no idea that within hours, the fire would ravage entire neighborhoods, including her 80-year-old church.

One of her parishioners witnessed the church burning as he evacuated.  

"He drove by and saw the church burned and the community hall just catching fire — with no response because the resources were so thin," Grindon said. 

She said 45 homes in her parish burned during the Eaton Fire.  Miraculously, the church's preschool and Grindon's home survived. 

"I learned about my home standing and my spiritual home burning back-to-back," she said. "I didn't believe it."

Determined to rebuild the church they lost, the St. Mark's parish will now gather in their temporary church in Eagle Rock. 

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