San Diego police detectives are investigating after parishioners at St. Paul’s Episcopal Cathedral arrived for services Sunday morning to find profane language spraypainted on the church’s walls and doors.
The black paint covered much of the outside of the building’s stucco and included crosses and profanity followed by the word “Christ.” Church officials said Monday that the San Diego Police Department Hate Crimes unit is investigating the incident.
“We want this to become a positive message, not a negative one,” Susan Jester, a spokesperson for the church, said Monday. “We’re not going anywhere … and we’ll let the police handle the investigation while we’ll just keep loving our neighbors.”
Jester said the church has had incidents of graffiti and tagging before but nothing to the level the congregation of about 400 members experienced on Sunday.
“We’ve never had anything specifically anti-Christ or anti-religious,” Jester said. “Just regular tagging, but nothing with a message.”
The Episcopal church located on Sixth Avenue near Olive Street has been a landmark in the Bankers Hill area, across from Balboa Park, since it was first constructed in 1951.
Church officials said their mission is “to love Christ, serve others and welcome all” and that they have embraced people from all over San Diego from many different backgrounds, including members of the LGBTQ community in Hillcrest, asylum seekers and refugees.
“We were disappointed to have to deal with damage to our sacred space on a special day of celebration for our congregation, but we know that God is love and that even someone so misguided is a beloved child of God; we will pray for them,” the Rev. Penny Bridges, St. Paul’s dean, said.
