Pacifica Stories

The goal of the partnership is for this small square of Santa Monica to be a place that encourages human flourishing. We want to honor God while encouraging students, staff, parents, and community members to think and live well. This endeavor takes on many forms: classes, church services, athletics, pastoral care, community service, guest speakers, business partnerships, and more.

Most recently, Pilgrim Lutheran and Pacifica’s Center for Philosophy & Theology co-hosted a fireside chat for the community on the topic of Nietzsche, Modernity, and the Recovery of Conservatism. Mr. Trey Dimsdale, the Executive Director of the Center for Religion, Culture and Democracy, discussed Nietzche’s impact on Christianity. The talk was moderated by Pastor John Nunes of Pilgrim Lutheran. Mr. Dimsdale and Pastor Nunes discussed how history informs the present and prepares us for the future. He also stressed the importance of humility moving forward without knowledge of the problems that might face us in the future, and the need to be open to adjusting our approach to new realities. Finally, the pair delved deeper into the modern church and the effect of expressive individualism on our relationship with God.

The talk was set in the lovely Santa Monica living room of Bob and Leslie Hamilton, who have hosted events for the community for years. Fifty guests from a cross-section of the community enjoyed the hospitality and conversation. The goal was to set the table for continued conversation about important issues.

About the Center
We ask essential questions at the intersection of philosophy and theology.

Our world has become disenchanted. Hundreds of years of intellectual, cultural, political, and economic revolutions—only accelerating in the past century—have evacuated our world of transcendence. We have become increasingly atomized and polarized: our basic human-to-human interaction is less frequent, our experience of political life is fragmented and chaotic, our relationship to our work is one of alienation, and the safety and support of family and communal life is notably absent. With the emergence of the internet and bio-technology, even our relationship to our own bodies and nature herself is tenuous. 

If everything is seemingly being torn apart, how can we bring it back together? The Pacifica Center for Philosophy + Theology aims to begin that process of reintegration by first reuniting philosophy and theology—the search for wisdom and the search for God are one and the same. It challenges those who participate in its offerings to wrestle with this long intellectual history for themselves, not with the aim of indoctrination, but rather with the hope that in doing so we will better understand where we stand in history and where we might go from here. 

Look for future events co-hosted by Pacifica and Pilgrim Lutheran Church.