Tampa Bay Times from St. Petersburg, Florida • 61

MAGAZINE OF RELIGION ST. PETERSBURG I a TP 1 Nation's newest Christian TV station begins operations By JEANNE PUGH StylwrgjrinriM R.iigjnn Wrhr Within the next few dv i out the Suncoast should be able to tune in the nation's newest Christian television station, WCLF (Where Christ's Love Flows). Operating from Largo studios, the station expects to be "on the air" on VHF Channel 22 with preliminary test programing by this weekend. Barring complications in the station's final negotia-fplwith the Federal Communication Commission (FCC), the new station expects to be offering 13'i-hour-a-day programing in about two weeks. Station officials said WCLF hopes to move eventually into 24-hour programing.

WCLF MAY BE the most powerful TV station in Florida, according to Bob D'Andrea, the Largo electrical contractor who is president of the station's parent, nonprofit organization, Christian Television Inc. With 5-milhon watts of power, the station's picture and Christian messages are expected to reach a broad semi-circle of the Suncoast from Weeki Wachee on the north, to Winter Haven on the east and Sarasota on the south. WCLF represents the culmination of more than three years of planning, fund-raising and praying by a team of "born again" Christians. "It hasn't been easy," D'Andrea told Crossroads this week. "But I have felt from the beginning that this is what God wanted me to do.

The Lord is totally in control. Three years ago, he said, he was content with his life as it was. His Italian grandparents had emigrated to America as Baptists, and he was raised in a Baptist Methodist home. He was "born again" 23 years ago, at the age of 18, while attending Youth for Christ meetings in bt. Petersburg.

He is a long-time member of Clearwater First Assemblv of Cod atartvA ness, Andrea Electric, 20 years ago. Then, in a single day, two men came to him separately and suggested that he take the lead in bringing Christian television to the Suncoast. "I questioned both of them," he said, "and discovered that they didn't know each other. Things like that are not coincidences." D'ANDREA ACCEPTED the idea as a "message from God" and began praying about it, he said. A week later, he decided to follow through and contacted a Christian group in Lakeland who, he had been told, was trying to obtain FCC permission to use Channel 28.

At "Coming Together Television Productions," the broadcast arm of Lakeland's First Assembly of God, D'Andrea met Paul Garber, 34, who is now WCLF's station manager. Garber had been working with the Lakeland group. D'Andrea joined forces with them, he said, "because I found that we had a common philosophy and goals." But, after a year of negotiations, it became apparent that the group was not going to be successful. Other contenders were competing for Channel 28. The group disbanded and D'Andrea organized Christian Television Inc.

and entered an application for Channel 22. See STATION, page 4 IBM mmm mmlm Jr I Martin Luther started the Protestant Reformation 462 years ago this Wednesday. Stories, page 2 A Seattle woman leaves the conventional life to find peace as a 'western guru. Story, page 3.