What a joy to open last Sunday’s Los Angeles Times and see a familiar face in a favorite place: Rosalio Muñoz, co-chair of the Chicano Moratorium, at Church of the Epiphany.

Saturday marks the 50th anniversary of the Moratorium, a series of demonstrations protesting the Vietnam War—and its disproportionate rate of Chicano casualties—while connecting it with social injustice at home.

Many know about this historic moment in the struggle for Chicano civil rights, and the Los Angeles Conservancy is close to getting several Moratorium-related sites listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

Fewer know that the pivotal East L.A. Moratorium march on August 29, 1970 was organized from the basement of another historic site, Church of the Epiphany.

This small church in the working-class neighborhood of Lincoln Heights played a key role in the Chicano movement of the 1960s and ’70s. In the same basement where the Moratorium took shape, young activists planned the 1968 East L.A. Student Walkouts (Blowouts) and produced La Raza, the (literally) underground newspaper and voice of the movement. The church also served as a planning base for United Farm Workers and Robert F. Kennedy’s presidential campaign.

Epiphany’s social justice work dates from the 1930s and continues today with tireless efforts on behalf of immigrants, workers, LGBTQ people, and community members.

The church embodies collective action. I saw it firsthand in 2018 while running Epiphany’s public engagement campaign for Partners in Preservation, a grant competition sponsored by the National Trust for Historic Preservation and American Express.

We needed to generate tens of thousands of online votes over a month in order to win funding for the building’s much-needed repair and restoration. With a devoted yet small congregation that couldn’t easily participate (most members don’t speak English or use email, both required for voting), we didn’t stand a chance without a major assist.

Our tenacious team—clergy (led by the indefatigable Father Tom Carey), parishioners, architects, activists, preservationists, communicators, friends—made the most of what we had: passion, stories, and relationships.

More than 50 religious, preservation, social justice, educational, cultural, government, and community organizations made the campaign their own, spreading the word and mobilizing action. For an entire month.

And, of course, there was Rosalio, organizing as he’s done for half a century. I’ll never forget sitting next to him, in that basement, as he casually went through his contact list—a who’s who of the Chicano movement.

He traveled by bus across the city to speak to a dozen Chicano Studies classes. The professors, some of them fellow activists from the movement, had their students take out their phones and vote on the spot.

These are just a few examples of the collective action that landed Epiphany in fourth place at the end of the competition, earning it the maximum grant amount of $150,000.

The work continues on all fronts. A march on Saturday will commemorate the Moratorium—and yes, Rosalio will be there.

Epiphany starts work on the basement in a few weeks and will launch the public phase of a capital campaign later this year. I can’t wait to see the kind of action that fixes the now-crumbling basement, leaky roof, and woefully outdated systems. The kind of action that positions this beloved landmark for another century of good works and good trouble.